One summer day, during a spontaneous meeting with my friend, we spontaneously decided that it would be good to go together somewhere where we could practice watersports:
me - diving, and her: windsurfing. Shortly after another friend decided spontaneusly to join us :)
As we were planning this trip somehow in autumn, the choice was easy: Egypt. It's easily accessible from Europe, it's relatively cheap, there's still very warm even in late autumn and last but not least - it offers amazing possibilities for diving, windsurfing and kitesurfing.
Despite the fact that travels to Egypt are not recommended by most of the EU countries, all travel agencies offer trips to this country - starting from 500 euros. Our search was quite limited as we wanted not only to dive (what is possible in all resorts located on the Red Sea), but also practice windsurfing or kitesurfing. We decided to go to Soma Bay - a coastal resort, 45 km south of Hurghada with a variety of nearby diving sites, as well as prevailing winds which are perfect for windsurfing and kitesurfing.
A few days before our trip to Egypt, a Russian plane flying from Sharm el-Sheikh to St Petersburg crashed. Assumptions that it was a bomb smuggled by jihadists from ISIS were not very comforting. Nevertheless we decided to go. We concluded that the security measures would be now at its high, and we would stay only in the resort. To my big regret I had to postpone to unknown future visiting of Egypt - Cairo, Luxor, Alexandria etc. In current situation it would not be the very wise. One day I will come back - Insh'allah.
On the day of our departure, while we wanted to check-in, it turned out that other tourists were not afraid to fly to Egypt either - the flight was overbooked and there was no more place on the board for us!! Luckily, thanks to EU Regulation 261/2004, we were not left behind. The carrier had to offer us an alternative flight + compensation of 600 euro (as we were supposed to fly over 3500 km). The alternative flight wasn't direct - but via Istanbul, but while checking in to this flight, it turned out that we fly business!! With these conditions, we easily accepted that our flight to Hurghada will take a bit longer than initially planned :)
We enjoyed a lot the amazing Turkish Airlines Business Lounge at the Istanbul Airport - not only great food (including my beloved baklava and thirteen kinds of olives!!), unlimited alcohol, relaxing atmosphere, but also a possibility to play golf!! :)
We arrived to Hurghada at 3 AM. Just before we reached the border guards at their counters, several men shouting names of their (and tourists') travel agencies surrounded us. It turned out that they were selling visas. Sometimes they increase prices, and sometimes they manage to sell those more expensive visas to us. And so they did manage to sell it to us ;-) Normally a visa costs 25 $, we paid slightly more. A rescue arrived unexpectedly from a man working for our travel agency who made the other guy return us the differen, and then he brought us outside the airport, where his colleague picked us up - luckily the transfer to the hotel was included in the trip. There are only a few hotels in Soma Bay, we stayed in Movenpick Resort Soma Bay.
The hotel itself was very pleasant. Located at the seaside (though a walk from the hotel to the beach was taking a few minutes), but also with a big swimming pool for those who don't like to walk too much. It offered several activities - such as SPA (where we were frequent guests :)), salsa classes, diving centre, and windsurfing/kitesurfing school.
There was also a Bedouine Tent with two lovely Rasta Bedouins, where it was possible to chill out with a cup of tea and a shisha.
But my main goal during this trip was diving - I was really looking
forward to my first underwater experience in Egypt!! I paid 160 euro for
a package of 5 dives (including equipment). After my last year's dives
in amazing Flores (Indonesia), I was a bit spoiled, nevertheless I was
still enjoying a lot diving in the Red Sea, though marine life was
definitely poorer. Some spots were better, some other were worse, but
the coral reefs were really beautiful. The highlight was definitely a
spectacular Panorama Reef - a huge coral formation, dropping to over 100 meters (I went down to 35 meters).
When I was not diving, I was enjoying the beach, the sun and 30 degrees :)
The hotel itself was very pleasant. Located at the seaside (though a walk from the hotel to the beach was taking a few minutes), but also with a big swimming pool for those who don't like to walk too much. It offered several activities - such as SPA (where we were frequent guests :)), salsa classes, diving centre, and windsurfing/kitesurfing school.
There was also a Bedouine Tent with two lovely Rasta Bedouins, where it was possible to chill out with a cup of tea and a shisha.
When I was not diving, I was enjoying the beach, the sun and 30 degrees :)
