Let's Call It A Vacation, Shall We?

Days 6, 7 & 8: Dahab

Last time we left off, I told you that our unbelievably long day in Giza wasn’t over after the Nile dinner. It was long from over. We needed to get on a bus that evening to get to the Red Sea. When we got back to the apartment we literally ran to our rooms, stuffed relevant stuff in a bag and ran to the curb to meet the taxis. It was stressful and a little exciting but mostly stressful. We arrived just on time for our 11pm bus to find out that we were wrong and it was actually a 12:30am bus so we were a little early. We also bought the last 7 tickets for the bus so guess where we sat? In the very back row. So no reclining seats and barely any leg space for about 9 hours. On the bright side, when the sun came up the view was spectacular. There were rocky deserts on one side and the Red Sea on the other. Too bad everyone almost everyone slept through it (or attempted to).

When we arrived in Dahab, however, it was all worth it.



The water was incredibly blue, the weather was perfect and the beaches, while too rocky to enjoy completely, were beautiful. Also, Saudi Arabia is off in the distance.



It was appropriate that the first thing we did was eat breakfast. The restaurants in Dahab are all basically the same but they have a certain charm. It must be because sitting on the ground to eat is very appealing to me.



The only problem with eating on the ground is that the wild cats that roam the area can and will steal your food if you don’t watch them. Anne lost some toast to a cat. This cat I believe:



All of our meals were like this. The waiters are also very active. They are like salesmen and will give you a deal on their food if you seem unwilling to eat at their establishment.
We ate a lot of fish, squid and shrimp thanks to these deals. After eating, we did a little shopping around for diving masters. After discovering a decent place we took the rest of the day off to rest for the diving we’d be doing the next day.

The next morning we headed out to a National Park in the Red Sea for our diving. It was about 30 minutes away from Dahab. Here’s a little map showing the region.



You can’t see where the dive spot is, but you can see everything else.
Because none of us had a diving license (or whatever it is we need) we had to go down with our dive masters. It was fun though. The very first sensation of breathing underwater is unreal and seeing the fish down there at their eye level as opposed to through a pair of goggles on top of them is amazing. You can see how psyched we were to do this.




But all good things come to an end. There was some snorkeling after and I took some pictures of the beach itself but soon we needed to get back to the hotel. This would be our last night on the beach. We had a great dinner with a very animated head waiter. We also met up with some of Dawn’s friends who were in the area. We left about midday the next day after breakfast. The bus drove us along the northern coast of the little peninsula we were on. 9 hours and several hundred terrible camel puns later (those armed guards at border totally were wearing “CAMEL-FLAUGE”) and we were back at Dawn’s apartment building where we needed to pack. I won’t share the trip back because, for all intents and purposes, it was the same trip to Egypt backwards. On one hand we got to go to most of Northern Egypt’s sites and we got to swim in the Red Sea. On the other hand, we were dead tired and we needed another vacation. Good times.

Pictures of the days

Quad bikes were also one of the activities that you could do at the beach. It seemed pretty popular.

This horse followed me around for a little. I guess it got separated from it’s group.

Sunset from the roof of our hotel.

My last picture of the beach.

And that’s it, ladies and gentlemen. I’ve got no more to tell you about Egypt, and to be frank writing about it was a chore at times. But have no fear; my next post will most definitely be about Bulgaria. In fact, it’ll be about the football (or soccer for you savages) league that I’m helping with. I would also like to mention that all of my photos are in the public gallery. They've been there since I've gotten back but I didn't feel like telling you guys.

That was Egypt. Thank god that’s over now.

-Zack