Sharm el-Sheikh is a Red Sea resort city on the southern tip of the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt (population 73,000 permanent residents, but accommodating up to 1 million tourists annually) — the premier diving and snorkelling destination in the world after the Great Barrier Reef, built around the extraordinary coral reef ecosystem of the Red Sea (the Red Sea has the highest water temperature and salinity of any major ocean region, creating the highest coral biodiversity outside the Coral Triangle; the reefs around Sharm el-Sheikh — the Ras Mohammed National Park, the Tiran Straits, the Straits of Gubal and the northern Sinai coast — contain over 1,000 species of fish and 250 species of coral; the visibility in the Red Sea can reach 30-40 m — greater than any equivalent reef system in the world). Sharm el-Sheikh was a small fishing village (Sharm el-Sheikh means "bay of the Sheikh" in Arabic) until 1967 when Israel occupied the Sinai in the Six-Day War and began developing it as a resort; returned to Egypt in 1982 under the Camp David Accords, Egypt then accelerated the resort development that created the modern city. The Naama Bay (the main beach resort strip of Sharm el-Sheikh — 2 km of waterfront hotels, diving centres, restaurants and beach clubs built on the north side of the Sharm bay; the centre of tourist Sharm; the Soho Square complex) and the Old Market (Sharm el-Sheikh's original market town, 3 km from Naama Bay, with the traditional bazaar character absent from the purpose-built resort areas) are the two contrasting faces of the city. The Mount Sinai and St. Catherine's Monastery day trip (3.5 hours north — the most significant biblical pilgrimage site in Egypt, where Moses received the Ten Commandments; the oldest continuously operating Christian monastery in the world, founded 337 AD) is the cultural complement to the underwater Sharm experience.
Ras Mohammed National Park (the marine and land protected area at the very tip of the Sinai Peninsula where the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Aqaba meet — the strongest tidal currents in the Red Sea bring deep, cold, nutrient-rich water up along the reef walls, creating the most productive reef ecosystem in the Red Sea; the park was designated Egypt's first national park in 1983; the main diving sites: Shark Reef and Yolanda Reef (the vertical coral wall dropping 80 m from the surface with the cargo ship Yolanda sunk in 1980 still visible at depth with its cargo of bathroom fixtures — toilet bowls and bathtubs encrusted with coral); the Shark Observatory (the cliff viewing point above the reef where hammerhead sharks are regularly seen from the surface in early morning); the mangroves of Ras Mohammed Bay (the northernmost mangrove forest in the world).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideThe Shark Reef dive at Ras Mohammed (the most famous dive site in the Red Sea — a vertical coral wall dropping 80 m from 3 m below the surface to the sandy floor; the coral wall is covered in soft corals (sea fans, sea whips, black corals) and sponges of extraordinary density and colour; the current at Shark Reef brings large pelagic species: grey reef sharks, white-tip reef sharks, barracuda schools, jack schools and the seasonal hammerhead sharks (the hammerhead sharks — Sphyrna lewini — gather at Ras Mohammed in the winter months October-March in schools of 50-100 individuals; they are visible at depth (25-35 m) on the corner of the reef where the current is strongest); the Yolanda cargo ship wreck at the south corner has become an artificial reef habitat.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideTiran Island (the island at the entrance to the Gulf of Aqaba, 8 km from Sharm el-Sheikh — the four reef systems of the Tiran Straits: Jackson Reef, Woodhouse Reef, Thomas Reef and Gordon Reef (the four coral plateaus in the Tiran Straits shipping channel, each with a wrecked ship at the top, each with different coral character and current strength; Jackson Reef is the most consistently exciting, with the Saudi-owned cargo ship Lara wrecked on the northern tip in 1981 accessible from the surface); the Tiran Straits were the geopolitical flashpoint of the 1967 Six-Day War (Egypt's closure of the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping in May 1967 was Israel's casus belli for the pre-emptive strike of June 5 — the Straits through which Sharm el-Sheikh now operates tourist dive boats were the trigger for a major Middle East war).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideNaama Bay (the 2 km resort waterfront of Sharm el-Sheikh — the restaurants, dive shops, beach clubs and promenade of the main tourist area; the Egyptian Red Sea seafood (the grilled hammour (orange-spotted grouper — the most prized fish of the Red Sea, sweet white flesh, grilled whole; the Red Sea hammour fishery is sustainably managed unlike the Gulf hammour); the shrimp (the Red Sea tiger shrimp, grilled with garlic butter); the calamari (the squid caught in the Red Sea fisheries off the Sinai coast); the Sofitel El-Balcon restaurant for the finest Red Sea fish dinner; the night dive (the Red Sea at night transforms completely — the parrotfish sleeping in mucus cocoons, the octopus and cuttlefish hunting, the Spanish dancer nudibranch (Hexabranchus sanguineus — the largest nudibranch in the world, bright red, flapping across the reef in a swimming motion at night).
Mount Sinai (Jebel Musa, "Mountain of Moses" — the 2,285 m summit in the southern Sinai massif, 3.5h north of Sharm el-Sheikh; the biblical site where Moses received the Ten Commandments (Exodus 19-20) is the most significant biblical pilgrimage site outside Jerusalem; the midnight ascent by camel or on foot (the Camel Path — 7 km, 750 m elevation gain from St. Catherine's, taking 2-3h; the Steps of Repentance — 3,750 steps carved by monks descending more steeply from near the summit) is done at night to arrive at the summit for sunrise; the summit Chapel of the Holy Trinity (the Greek Orthodox chapel built on the summit in 1934 on the site of the 4th-century original); the sunrise from the 2,285 m summit over the Sinai massif — one of the most dramatic dawn landscapes in the Middle East.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideSt. Catherine's Monastery (the Greek Orthodox monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai — founded 337 AD by the Emperor Justinian, making it the oldest continuously operating Christian monastery in the world; the monastery is named after Catherine of Alexandria whose body was transported by angels to the peak of the nearby Jebel Katrina after her martyrdom in Alexandria; the monastery contains: the Burning Bush (the living bramble bush, believed to be a descendant of the original bush in which God appeared to Moses; guarded behind a protective railing, the bush grows above the Chapel of the Burning Bush), the most significant collection of religious icons in the world outside Moscow (over 2,000 icons, including 150 from before the 9th century — surviving the Byzantine iconoclasm which destroyed most early Christian imagery), and the second-largest collection of illuminated biblical manuscripts after the Vatican.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBlue Hole Dahab (60 km north of Sharm el-Sheikh on the Gulf of Aqaba coast — the most famous dive site in the Red Sea and the world's most dangerous dive site: a circular opening in the coral reef 6 m in diameter at the surface, dropping 130 m to a sandy floor; the "Arch" (the underwater arch at 52-56 m connecting the blue hole to the open sea — the target of advanced divers; numerous fatalities have occurred from decompression sickness attempting the arch at depth); for snorkellers and recreational divers, the Blue Hole is extraordinarily beautiful — the colour gradient from azure blue at 6 m to deep violet at 40 m, the coral walls, the glassfish schools and the occasional turtle are visible without deep diving; the Bedouin café on the reef edge serves tea while watching snorkellers.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideDahab (the small coastal town 100 km north of Sharm el-Sheikh — the alternative to Sharm el-Sheikh's mass tourism; a Bedouin village transformed into a budget-travel hub in the 1990s with the characteristic Dahab atmosphere: the floor cushion restaurants on the seafront, the mangal (barbecue) with the fresh fish, the Bedouin tea ceremony, the windsurfing (the Dahab Lagoon is one of the world's top 10 windsurfing destinations due to the constant Gulf of Aqaba thermal wind — the afternoon wind builds predictably from 14:00 to sunset at 15-25 knots; the flat-water lagoon is ideal for beginners and the open Gulf for advanced); the Dahab sunset over the Saudi Arabian mountains across the Gulf of Aqaba — the mountains of Saudi Arabia are visible 35 km across the water.
The Colored Canyon (Wadi Nasb, 150 km north of Sharm el-Sheikh — the most visually spectacular geological formation in the Sinai Peninsula; a 700 m sandstone slot canyon carved by ancient flash floods, with walls ranging from white, yellow, red, purple and black in the various mineral layers of the Nubian sandstone; the canyon narrows to less than 1 m in places (visitors turn sideways to pass through); the colors are most intense in the first 2 hours after sunrise when the direct light illuminates the canyon walls; the Colored Canyon is always visited as part of a Bedouin-guided desert safari by 4WD from Sharm — the drive through the central Sinai desert passes the High Mountain Region and the acacia-lined wadis that are the Bedouin homeland.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideThe Sinai Bedouin (the indigenous population of the Sinai Peninsula — the Tiyaha, the Tarabin, the Muzayna, the Sawarka and the Jebeliya tribes; the Jebeliya (the "Mountain people") who live around St. Catherine's Monastery are descendants of Balkan Christians brought to serve the monastery by Justinian in the 6th century, who converted to Islam in the 7th century but maintained a distinct identity; the Bedouin tea (heavily sweetened black tea with dried sage (miramieh) from the Sinai mountain slopes — the standard hospitality offering; sage tea is the medicinal drink of the Sinai, with genuine antimicrobial properties confirmed by modern research); the Bedouin goat-hair tent (the beit al-shaar — the black goat-hair tent, the traditional portable dwelling of the desert nomad) and the traditional embroidery of the Sinai Bedouin women (the most distinctive folk textile tradition in Egypt).
Wadi Ghazala (the "Gazelle Valley" in the central Sinai, accessible from the Colored Canyon safari route — one of the few wadis in the Sinai where wild Nubian ibex (Capra nubiana) are still occasionally spotted; the ibex (the desert wild goat with the dramatic backward-curving horns) was the most important game animal of the ancient Sinai and appears in the Nabataean rock inscriptions and petroglyphs throughout the wadis; the Nabataean rock inscriptions at Wadi Mukattab (the "Written Valley") nearby contain over 30,000 inscriptions in Nabataean, Greek, Latin and Arabic recording the passage of traders and pilgrims on the ancient Sinai trade route since the 4th century BC; the inscriptions are the largest collection of ancient graffiti in the Middle East).
Shark's Bay (the secluded bay 5 km north of Naama Bay — the bay that gives Sharm el-Sheikh its "shark" connection; the name derives from the grey reef sharks that used to enter the bay in the tidal season before development; the Shark's Bay beach is the finest accessible beach in the Sharm el-Sheikh area for independent visitors — less resort-managed than Naama Bay, with a small reef accessible by snorkelling from the beach; the Red Sea sunset from Shark's Bay (the Gulf of Aqaba faces west, so the sunset illuminates the Saudi Arabian mountains across the water in pink and orange; the colours at Sharm el-Sheikh's evening over the Gulf of Aqaba — with the coral reef below the surface and the desert mountains above the horizon on both sides — create the most spectacular coastal sunset scene in Egypt).