Dahab, South Sinai

Dear All,

If you do not’ve already been staying in a cave or perhaps in a coma for a long time you'll be aware associated with the social, economic and political upheavals that Egypt moved through over the past 4 many years. Even though this year’s presidential elections went smoothly and there's a better sense of security and soothe in a lot of the country tomorrow is through no means obvious and certain specific areas associated with the nation (specially Northern Sinai) continue to be lawless out of bounds to all or any outsiders except the armed forces and those with criminal or suicidal tendencies.

Sensationalist headlines such; “The lawless Sinai” and, “Sinai is the brand new Afghanistan!” make the entire Sinai Peninsula seem like some specially unpleasant spot of hell. What number of people have said “maybe I’ll visit Egypt?” and then bombarded by people suggesting that “it’s also dangerous” and “are you crazy?”

So might be those of us just who stay in Dahab (South Sinai) cowering behind barricades’ wearing flak jackets and tin hats? Well, I can’t speak for all ( possibly one specially paranoid citizen is cowering in their cellar someplace) but myself Im sat within my work computer system, searching to Saudi Arabia 20 kms roughly across the Gulf of Aqaba and it also’s an ideal, gorgeous, hot bright autumn time. Various windsurfer s are taking pleasure in Dahab’s perfect sailing winds; a group of freedivers are bobbing around on the surface 100 meters off coast, appreciating Dahab’s exemplary freediving conditions; a foreign citizen strolls by with a her two young kids (one in a pushchair) and all i could hear is the waves, some laughter from next-door in addition to Cure (from my music collection!) while we watch for our 3 Advanced Open Water pupils to arrive to explore Dahab’s radiant reefs and marine life (we’ll go directly to the ‘The Islands’ these days i do believe)

Rather an idyllic scene, far removed from just what the media will have you think. Tends perfect does not it? Except that since I composed in regards to the lady walking by together children, not just one single other person has walked by which is Dahab’s ‘high’ period (it ought to be described at this juncture that I type with 2 fingers while making numerous mistakes, which means this is quite a long time period!)

Costs are rising, site visitors tend to be decreasing and some operators are slashing (currently low) costs to grab a few of the reduced cake. Various great dive centers tend to be continuing to withstand the stress to dump prices so that they can maintain great gear, small teams and large standards if you appreciate them, but market causes tend to be against united states. ‘No profit’ and ‘high quality’ alllow for a rather bad relationship as well as don’t stay together a long time.

Things tend to be not likely for much busier until international governing bodies change their travel advice while the media figure out how to differentiate between ‘north’ and ‘south’ (strange, they may be able do that with Korea, Sudan and Ireland) In the meantime, those of us just who live in South Sinai hope we can see through this slim period and still be here available quality Scuba diving to those that want it.

In closing, is Dahab secure? Well, we don’t have our minds stuck within the desert sands that surround our little oasis and bad things can occur, but together buyer phrased it “Dahab is as safe as worldwide terrorism enables everywhere to be” … literally addresses it!