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Published: April 26th 2008
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jelly fish
is it deadly? no. you can touch it if you want there are 50 photos on this one! make sure you scroll and click next, there are three pages to look at !!
Dahab, we're sad to leave you but the time has come. We had some good times and horrible times but they were memorable just the same. We will miss you and all the people that are a couple degrees off. Kims dive instructor summed up dahab with this line "the worlds self-check in mental institution" and we say this with the best of intentions, the people were interesting and fun. We will miss the wind, the begging one eyed diseased cats, the relentlessly pushy taxi drivers, the never ending sunshine and the late nights. But as modest mouse said, "the good times are killing me," so we will move on and do some more exploring.
We settled in pretty quick in Dahab and developed a daily routine. Get up in the late morning, eat some cereal and eggs at home, and go snorkeling/diving until the late afternoon. There are killer snorkeling and diving spots all up and down the coast in walking distance, so we did tons of snorkeling. It's free too. Then eat something, shower, and
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teeming with life go to work. Work until late at night, and go home. Dahab is a small place, so we were quick to get to know a lot of people. A lot of sort of strange people, which are the best kind!
On our days off, we would go do something like take a trip somewhere. We did some camel riding to a national park called Ras Abu Gallum, where we did some snorkeling and fish eating with our friend Bill. Riding a camel is not the most comfortable thing a person can do. I give props to Lawrence of Arabia for his camel riding endurance. An hour and a half on a camel is enough for the novelty to wear off and the chafing to set in. We also went to the camel races which only happen a few times a year. That was a highlight for sure. Hundreds of beduins and the camel jockeys were kids! It was out in the desert and they went around a 2 mile track 3 times. There were three or four different heats, each one more important than the last. Camels don't really seem like they're meant for running. They're super awkward and
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like being in an aquarium develop this disgusting white foam around their mouth when they're tired. I've never seen it personally, but I've heard that when a camel gets upset it throws up its stomach and it hangs outside its mouth.
We also did some excellent scuba diving in the Red Sea. Kim got her open water and advanced open water in dahab, and we went to some world class dive sites. The blue hole, which is famous for tech diving. You see guys there with two tanks on their back, one under each arm, and another extra one. One tank and a hundred feet is enough for me, thanks. The blue hole is a deep hole that starts about ten feet from the shore, and is a big hole in the reef. Close to the blue hole is the canyon, another amazing site where you get to do down into an underwater canyon. But even better than those was the Thislegorm. We did an overnight trip the thislegorm and Ras Mohammed National Park, where we slept on the boat overnight. We had some good company with our friends scott and dave and Krista (who likes to throw cats into the ocean). The Thislegorm
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NEMO!! recognize this cheeky little clownfish? is a British supply ship that was bombed by the Nazis in world war two. It sunk sitting upright a hundred feet deep and there's a huge hole in the side where the bomb hit. This makes easy entry into the wreck. Inside there are trucks carrying motorcycles in the back, some with their tires still inflated. There are some tanks, lots of rubber boots, some airplane wings, and on top, a locomotive still sits there. We did one dive on the outside and one on the inside. There are huge guns and shells four feet long. And all around the ship are massive fish.
We also climbed the notorious Mt. Sinai. For those of you that don't know, read Exodus chapter 20. Most people do the hike around 3 am to catch the sunrise, we did it the opposite to catch the sunset. Hiking in the desert was both incredible and intolerable! But our near heat exhaustion state after the last 700 steps payed off in the end because we had the mountain top practically to ourselves for the sunset. I'm not sure how true this is, but someone told us that a monk did something really bad
and his punishment was to make the stone steps leading up to the top of the mountain. A lot of the steps are carved out of the rock. I wonder what he did?
So the Dahab experience is over. We had an amazing two months. I(bob) learned that I'm not cut out for bar or restaruant work. I'd much rather dig a hole or build a house. Kim learned how to scuba dive, and we picked up a few words of arabic. We also made some good friends. You know who you are. Ma Salama
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