Dahab
Trip Start
Feb 19, 2010
1
21
257
Trip End
Jan 31, 2012
Dahab, Red Sea and Sinai, Egypt
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Took the overnight bus to Dahab from Luxor. Left at 4:30pm and arrived at 11am. Another long night on a bus (18hrs). Found that the place I wanted to stay was full so had to find another one. Ended up finding out tht the girls had made reservation for me but unfortuntely my name was not written into it. In the end shouldnt have bothered to get a room since I did the Mt Sinai tour which left t 11pm and so didnt sleep in the bed anyway. Would have been better off leaving my bag behind the counter.
Had originally planned to dive with the Red Sea Relax diver center but talking to the guy behind the counter put me off. He definately had an attitude problem. After do some price comparison and seeing that most places only had few Euro difference in price (20-25 euro) decided to go with Sea Dancer club since they had new gear and Steve who manges the shop seemed decent enough bloke with some idea of what he was doing. The dive center lso did a trip to the thistlegorm which was why I first entered the dive centre.
Ended up doing a refresher dive around the coral near the shore. Place was known as the light house for some reason. My guide Imard was a good dive buddy since he pointed out lot of marine life I may of not of otherwise spotted. Managed to see lots of coral and fish as well as an octopus crawling along the bottom.
At the start of my dive while I was going through the basic dive skills (taking regulator out of mouth and recovering it, taking mask off then putting it back on then clearing it, buddy breathing and bouancy) Had some trouble with bouancy part so ended up needing to put some rocks into my BC in order to increase my weight so I could stay down.
After the dive wndered around the dive. Lots of retuarants along the shore with people trying to get you to enter. Unlike Luxor they tending to be freindly and ask you to visit their establishment and if you declined they didnt continue to harrs you. Certianly a lot more laid back.
At 11pm ended up getting on a bus to Mt Sinai for 2 and a bit hour drive. Given the number of check points I have gone through the lst few weeks and the number of tourist police/ police I must say that Egypt is definately a police state but I guess when most of you countries economical income comes from tourism you dont want any mishaps to jepordise it.
Spent a couple of hour walking up the easy way (up gradul slope rather than the stairs) and took loger than I normally would since there were couple of people in the group I was in who were struggling. Basically all groups going up had to go with guide. Lots of coffee shops on the way up and calls by camel driver sking people if they wanted to take camel to the top. Had a number of camels pass us on the way up so hd to continually get out of the way to avoid being trampled. Later in Dahab when I talked to someone who had been up Mt Sini 20yrs earlier they said that the circus had not been in town when they did it last time. That is you did not have all the coffee houses and highly tourised climb to the top.
After reaching the last cofee house it was necessary to do the last 350 steps to the top. Lots and lots of people ended up cramming on top. Saw a number of people holding mass an a rabii doing prayers. Watch the sun come up. Some nice views with a few moutain tops with huts. Looks like a nice place to do a hike.
On the way dow we decided to take the 3000 steps of penance. Unfortuantely on the day after I found my knee did do a penance coming down. Knee has not recovered from last year and while its been a bit saw from time to time during the trip, the trip down the steps caused a particularly tender spot on the front of the knee. Guess a ligament or tendonthat hasnt been working to hard got a workout. Thankfully didnt effect my ability to dive in the following days but Im sure the diving didnt help the general stiffness in my knee.
Had a nice walk down and upon reaching the bottom wandered around before visiting the monastary. Lots of Russian tourists visiting the monastary made it a fairly unpleasant trip due to the crowds. Ended up being a few of minutes in and then out.
On the way down part of the group got separated from the guide and a misunderstanding between Saliha and the guide ended up with the guide disappearing. The initial misunderstanding, due to english being a second language of both people was caused, I believe, because the guide didnt want to visit the museum without the whole group. The conversation then turned into a completely different direction about going back to the bus. In the end turn a bit nasty and the guide left. Ended up having to ring the hotel in order to find the bus back to Dahab.
All in all a pleasant morning. Even it was one with only minimal sleep.
