Dahab and the Red Sea

A brake was much needed after all the temples and street hassling. We were told by many people how great Dahab is for its diving and calm atmosphere, so we had long decided to end our Egypt travels in Dahab(located on the Sınaı pennısula). Expecting to only stay 2 or 3 days max we have ended up staying about 5 days. Since being here we have spent our days diving, relaxing at the restaurant lawn chairs, and hanging out with friends.

We did three diving trips-lighthouse, canyon and blue hole. Lighthouse is a site super close to our hostel and to be honest was pretty average for coral and fish. We were told to dive there because it’s a good and easy site to visit plus it’s a way for the dive masters to check our weights since there is so much salt in the red sea your buoyancy is higher. Although we were pretty unimpressed, it was still a fun dive and were lookıng foward to dıvıng at the other, more famous dıve sıtes.

The next day we drove about 15 minutes along the coast to canyon and blue hole. In the morning we dived at canyon which is a long narrow canyon ranging in depth from 18-50m. Most of the coral is dead because of all the tourism, but at the end of the dive we went down into this crack where we saw schools of fish. The canyon was impressive but would have been amazing to see it filled with coral, what a site that would have been. After a lunch break we suited up and walked into blue hole. This dive site is one of Dahab most famous site because of how incredibly blue the water is and how deep it goes, 160m. We started at the blue hole and continued along the cliff to the bells. Again, most of the coral is dead but the site and layout of the cliff is different then other dives.

Just before leaving Egypt, we spent our second to last night hiking up Mt. Sinai which stands 2285m above sea level. We left our hostel at about 10pm and drove two hours to the bottom of Mt. Sinai where we were greeted by a local guide. There are two paths which you can choose from to walk up Mt. Sinai. Our guide took us up Camels Path which is the longer route but much easier to walk in the night time. Although it is night time and very dark we were just two days short of the full moon so it was surprisingly bright out. The hike up takes about 2 hours but with several hours to kill before the sun rises we stopped at the little tea shops along the way and warmed our body’s in the warm huts. Just before arriving to the top, the camel’s path joined up with the Steps of Repentance and we had to walk up about 700 steps before arriving to the top. Once we made it to the top, Heather and I pulled out our sleeping bags and rented a wool blanket to keep ourselves warm. Cuddling trying to keep ourselves warm and out of the wind we rested for about at an hour and half till the sunrise. This hour and half was miserable, we were freezing and our toes were so cold they hurt to move. We started to ask ourselves why we choose to hike Mt. Sinai in the middle of the night, but once the sun started to rise we were so thankful we did. The sky was clear and the sunrise was brilliant, one of the best ones we have seen so far. It was awesome to ımagıne Moses receıvıng the 10 commandments at the top of thıs beautıful mountaın. After we greeted the sun, we gathered with the rest of the group and decided to take the Steps of Repentance down. This path is a bit shorter but tougher on the legs because there are 3750 steps down. These steps were built by a single monk in order to fulfill his pledge of penitence.
Once we arrived at the bottom we all piled back in the van and headed back to Dahab were I gather most everyone like us spent the day sleeping and recovering from our night hike. Although we only had a day or so left we simply relaxed, packed and prepared ourselves for our long travel day to Jerusalem, Israel.