While in Dahab, it's easy to forget that you're in Egypt. Conservative social norms regarding clothing and covering no longer exist. It's acceptable as a female to walk around in shorts and even a bathing suit top. Interestingly, Dahab is also the only other place I've been where it is appropriate and expected to eat meals while lying down or at the very least in a lounging position.
A long brick walk paves its way along the length of Dahab. On the right lies mostly seating areas for restaurants, small areas of "beach", and scuba diving entry sites. On the left sit a shops selling cheesy t-shirts, sheesha pipes, glass lamps, jewelry and handbags. Length wise, the walkway is sadly divided in half with a bridge over a barren cement area, which presents the destruction of a terrorist bomb which murdered 23 people and injured 75 in 2006. Chunks of the walkway are removed from the pavement representing shards from the bomb. Despite this relatively recent terrorist attack, Dahab feels very relaxed, safe, and mellow.
The restaurants serve pancakes, spaghetti, pizza, ice cream and many other foreigner favorites. The setting is the best -- many cushioned benches -- the equivalent of sofas are perched right on the sea atop a sand covered floor. If there aren't "sofas", then several colorful mats are thrown on the floor with large cushions. These serve as the perfect place to snuggle up with a book or journal and spend the afternoon. With restaurant names like "Chill Out" you feel perfectly comfortable doing so; there's no such thing as overstaying your welcome at a restaurant in Dahab. Similar to other parts of Egypt there is an overwhelming number of friendly cats -- relatively plump and clean for 'street' cats -- who will curl up next to you and purr at the slightest sign of affection. This was wonderful for me as I've begun to miss my two kitties -- Fatty and Kitty-Kitty.
Dahab has a strong wind blowing daily, which makes it a wind surfer paradise. Their sails often dot the sea. The only place without wind is a small bay area where restaurant sofas and pillows are replaced with lounge chairs. Fresh fruit juices and any typical Dahab Dish is brought to you by an eager Egyptians who are paid by the number of customers they can reel in to their particular restaurant. It truly is a surreal experience to be sipping mango juice in a bikini staring across the sea to the mountains and town (visible by lights at night) of Saudi Arabia.
If it is a wind surfer's paradise, then it is a diver's kingdom. The reef sits so close to the shore that you literally walk into the sea with your wets suit, weight belt, and tank and BCD (inflatable vest) already on (this is quite heavy and hot). You put your flippers and mask on in the water and descend into the depths below not even 100 yards away from your mango juice and lounge chair. The diving is quite different than in Hondruas and Belize (where I've done all of my previous diving). There, you simply fall backwards from your dive boat in the water and start out with a birds eye view of the coral. The water is also much saltier in the Red Sea and the temperature much cooler than the Carribean waters requiring 2 wet suits. The salinity and double wet suit make you much more buoyant -- in Honduras I wear a 12 lb wt belt where in the Red Sea, I finally settled on 24lbs.
Alberto and I could not figure out our correct weight belts on the first day. For you non-divers, ideally while scuba diving you become buoyant, which practically means you reach a floating state at a depth in which you simply hover over the coral. You obtain this balance by inflating a vest (BCD) and having the correct weight on your belt, once you've got your buoyancy, small changes in depth during the dive are controlled by your breath (breathing on top of inflated/deflated lungs). So, as you can see, needing to constantly inflate and deflate your BCD underwater not only shortens your dive (because the same tank for breathing is used to fill your vest). Let's just say we had rather short 35-40min frustrating dives on day 1.
However, our second through fourth day absolutely blew my mind. From the beginning the dive fascinates you because of the entry point. Yes, you can slowly slide down a sandy slope to the coral, but more advanced dives require you to slip through a crack in the reef... or our favorite entry point, the Bells, requires you to descend 92 feet straight down through a chimney like structure. On three sides you have a chute made from rock, and in front of you is the deep blue sea. After getting to exactly 91 feet, you can leave the chute through an archway. On the path to this entry point, there are many signs cherishing the memories of divers who died here. [It is one of the most dangerous dives in the world, but because people attempt to go past 92 feet to a second archway located 213 ft. Once you go that deep, unless you have specialized equipment you usually suffer from disorientation as well as a bit of nitrogen narcosis. Don't worry, we were responsible divers and are terrified of going that deep. Although, some people do with tanks, and they are technical divers. And some people do it withOUT a tank, they are called Free Divers. We saw some in this "Blue Hole" (where you swim after the Bells entry point). This Blue Hole held the Technical Diving record of 312 m (1023ft) until last year when someone broke it in Corsica (334m). The wildlife is also incredible: we saw an octopus, sea cucumbers, barracudas, napoleon fish, Nemo's (in anemone) and many many many uncountable schools of bright colored fish.
Our other main adventure in the Sinai Peninsula was not found in the depths of the ocean but in the height of the red rock jagged edge mountains of the interior. We left Dahab at 11pm and began our hike at 1am, hoping to be at the summit by sunrise. This is supposedly the summit where Moses received the 10 Commandments from God. It was a dark climb; you always needed to be wary of camels, which were paraded up and down the path by their Bedowin owners. The final half hour we did the final 750 of the 3,750 steps of repentance (don't worry we did the full 3,750 on the way down) mostly made out of rock. "STEPS?" I remember thinking grumpily on my way up, "It's more like random rocks!" My mood was not helped when both of our flashlights ran out of batteries during these final 750 steps. Now we laugh about it, but we could have fallen off the cliff in the middle of the night.
We arrived at the summit, sweaty and in complete darkness. There we waited about 1 hour for the sun to rise. First, showing itself with a red streak across the horizon. As our excitement grew, so did the quickness with which the sun was rising, and before we knew it we were surrounded by thousands of reddish-brown jagged edge mountains. It was truly one of the most beautiful sunsets I've ever seen in my life. Then, reality sunk it; cold hungry, and exhausted we had to hike the 3750 steps down to Elija's basin and then to St Katherine's Monastery, home of the burning bush.
Our time in Egypt was completed with trips to Coptic and Islamic Cairo, eating wonderful food, and saying goodbye to the wonderful friends I had made during my stay in Cairo.
Definitely a trip of a lifetime.
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