An Egyptian Chill



We spent the Thanksgiving (and Armed Forces Day) long weekend in Dahab, one of the most “chilled out” cities I’ve ever visited.  During the trip we climbed Mount Sinai and experienced the first chill (as in cold) we’ve had in Egypt so far.  It’s mid October and the afternoon temperature is still getting over 30 degrees celcius in Cairo.

Dahab is a coastal city in the Sinai Peninsula.  It is known as the “Thailand of Egypt” because of its backpacker atmosphere.  The main boardwalk along the water is lined with restaurants, dive shops, and souvenir boutiques.  Most of the restaurants have lots of pillows on the ground to sit on and enjoy shakes, tea, sheesha, or a full meal.  Tom and I

enjoyed many meals sitting on these pillows along with our travel buddies.  This was a particularly enjoyable meal because it was accompanied by cold beer and a game of Taboo. As you would expect, Tom and I kicked some behind.  We are “Team Invincible” after all. 

Although the entire long weekend could have easily and happily been spent relaxing in restaurants, at our hotel pool, and on the beach, we kept ourselves fairly busy.  On our second night we climbed Mount Sinai, a destination with significance for Christians, Muslims, and Jews, as it is where Moses received the Ten Commandments.

Beyond its religious importance, it provides spectacular views, most famously at sunrise.  In order to be at the top of Mount Sinai for sunrise, we took a bus to the mountain at 11pm, and started the climb at 2am.  It was exhausting, but given the chance I would do it the same way.

After bustling our way through hundreds of people and camels, we reached the top of Mount Sinai around 3:30am.  As if just for us, at the instant that we reached the peak a religious group began singing “Amazing Grace” in Italian.  Their voices were beautiful along with the silhouettes of mountains all around in the darkness.  Those first few minutes at the top of Mount Sinai were the highlight of the entire trip for me.

There were very few people at the top when we arrived, so we had our pick of spots.  We parked ourselves on the roof of a concrete building, and took the opportunity to get a little sleep.  It was quite chilly up there, but we brought our sleeping bag and were able to sleep surprisingly well.  The morning was even colder, but the sleeping bag kept me warm.  Also Tom made coffee and hot chocolate on our camping stove, which helped warm us from the inside out.

Despite the nearly 3000 people who were at the top of Mount Sinai by morning, the sunrise was peaceful. 

We took our time and checked out all the views while most people headed back down the mountain.  After taking in the panoramic views and the simple but beautiful chapel, we headed back down via the stairs, where there wouldn’t be any camels. 
Back at the bottom, we visited St. Katharine’s Monastery which houses the burning bush, Moses’ Well, and some incredibly old icons and manuscripts (as far back as the 4th century).

The bus trip back to Dahab was quick, and we made it back just in time to get our hotel’s complimentary breakfast.  I don’t think I’ll ever get sick of banana pancakes.  We napped and spent the bulk of the day relaxing.  We needed to get our energy back up for the scuba diving we planned for the following day.  The two scuba dives we did the next morning had very unique seascapes.  Our first dive was into  “The Canyon”, quite literally an underwater canyon, and the second was into “The Blue Hole”, an extremely deep circular reef.   Of course we saw fish… lots of them… in lots of colours… and the largest parrot fish I’ve ever seen by a longshot.

We left a couple of hours after scuba diving to head back to Cairo to a more hectic life.  Dahab must have affected us though.  We stopped for lunch on our way grocery shopping a few days ago in Cairo and chose to sit at one of only a few tables with pillows on the floor for seats.  Our dining room décor may be ery different when we get back to Canada.