Sharm el Sheik

A few days ago, somewhere on the Nile, I reached that point in traveling where I loose track of what's happening and everything blurs together into the immediate.  It happened in Libya and in Ireland.  It happens when I am continuously moving rather than based in one place.  I will have to settle to complete writing up the story of the trip from Aswan to Luxor and then to here in Sinai.

I don't much like Sharm el Sheik.  It has no reason for being, apart from the throngs of tourists who crowd the lounges on the beach or stroll in their bikinis through the restaurants and cafes that line the esplanade.  But the Red Sea remains and the stunning mountains rise out of the desert all around.  

The first day here, I went snorkeling.  There was a misunderstanding about time, but I got picked up as arranged and the only other person in the minibus was a charming young woman from Tunisia who was working at the embassy in Malta.  So I wasn't prepared for the sheer numbers of people who were lining the jetties to get onto the boats taking us to the National Park.  Fortunately we had a smaller boat so there was only about 20 people with us but we still had to shuffle in queues to board our cruiser. 

All the boats headed out in the same direction and our guide explained that we would have three stops for snorkeling - two in the  National Park area and one in the bay on the way back.  The scenery of mountains and desert running down to the sea is stunning.  The photo is of our third stop where there was also two submarines taking tourists along the edge of the reef.

But the first two stops made it worthwhile.   There were one or two other boats anchored up when we arrived at our first spot.  Our guide had prepared us as best he could on the trip out but there were still several people who had never snorkeled before.  I was one of the first in and turned in time to see my Tunisian traveling companion loose her mask as she jumped in.  The guide was busy helping others to stop hyper-ventilating so I dived down and saved the mask just as it was sinking below the level of my ear drum tolerance!  I remembered the excitement of diving down to touch bottom in the middle of St Georges bay in Malta when I was a child.

Unlike the Great Barrier reef, the Red Sea reefs are close to shore so we were able to swim easily along the edge of the reef and then go ashore on the sandy beach to rest.  The guide worked very hard to keep us together as he was rightly concerned about loosing some of us. 

There were very different levels of ability in the group and also several other groups swimming on the same reef and crossing our path from time to time.  But we saw an eagle ray almost straight away and once we had found the edge of the reef, we were able to work our way along.  At first I thought it was similar to the Australian reef and it is, but it differs in the quantity and colour of the fish which left me quiet with the beauty of it. 

The second reef was even more stunning.  It was in more shallow water than the first and the shoals of sparkling fish drifted around massive purple corals whilst pairs of angel fish hid in holes and crevasses.  I went willingly into this other world, only vaguely keeping one ear open for the whistle of our guide to keep us together.  By the time it was time to go back to the boat, we had drifted some way away and several other boats and groups had arrived.  The woman from Tunisia was tired and the guide had to help her on the swim back.  As we swam across, yet another boat arrived and kept sounding his horn because he wanted to cut across where we were swimming.  There is no doubt there is an accident waiting to happen around this magnificent reef, but fortunately it didn't happen that day.

I didn't go in for the third dive because surprisingly I was cold and we had just eaten our excellent lunch.  The site looked even more exploited than the first two that were protected by National Park status.  But I feel very glad that I have been able to see some of the Red Sea reef before we loose it to global warming or over exploitation.  Tonight I go to St Catherine's monastery and climb Mt Sinai to see the dawn.