Hi everybody,
more news from Dahab. I have to tell you > it really is a dump. But maybe you could call it a half-decent one.
One thing for sure. It is becoming another tourist trap...You get the usual shops selling tshirts and you got the guys on the street trying to convince you that the bargain of your life is just around the corner in the next store.
What was really new for me though, was the fact that every car on the cities street suddenly mutates into a taxi when a foreigner is out and waiting. I was just standing in front of the hotel waiting for Lotta to pick me up and every few seconds I heard " taxi ? taxi ? " and that regardless of the car that was passing by. Okay, on milltary car passing > they didn't say anything and neither did I. Most of the cars on the road are pickup trucks made in by Japanese Companies.
Freedive dahab is located at the Jasmina Hotel which is not the one where I am staying so I was glad for the ride since I didn't know the right way yet.
Lotta is doing training dives with me and Anton from Russia. He is from Moskow and trains with some other russian freedivers. But his English is not really good so he did not take a regular course. And I am mostly here to see what it is like to freedive in the Red Sea and how my body copes with it.
A big issue is dehydration. You have to drink much more water than you are normally used to and it's still not enough. The effect is that after a day of freediving and being out in the desert you get really tired and maybe even have a headache. Equalization may also get worse.
So you see us running around with 1,5 Liter Bottles of Water. Too still boost that you can get some extra rehydraton powder at the pharmarcie.
This is a good example of how the local ecomnomy is working here. As far as Lotta heard the phamarcie can not charge more than the official price for the medicine which is 2,5 egyptian pounds. That price is even written on the package. But if you walk into the pharmacie as a tourist you will get charged more. A customer of Lotta's got charged ten egytian pounds and when I asked myself for it at another pharmacie as a test I heard 5 egyptian pounds. When Lotta was arguing with guy on the counter I said she will get "special prices" but others won't. When a talk with the police was suggested, he just said, that he has got no problem with the police or America. We don't know what America has got to do with this but the guy had to get the point through that he hates America, probably because of their low prices for medicine.
Dahab is very nice at night when the lights are switched on and you can stroll along the beachfront where you will find restaurants where you can leisurely dine while listening to the surf.
It was very rough out there and also very windy which I heard is normal.
Money can be changed at a bank or pulled from a maschine that acceptes credit cards and Maestro cards.
Tomorrow I'll write more about the blue hole.
best wishes
Holger
more news from Dahab. I have to tell you > it really is a dump. But maybe you could call it a half-decent one.
One thing for sure. It is becoming another tourist trap...You get the usual shops selling tshirts and you got the guys on the street trying to convince you that the bargain of your life is just around the corner in the next store.
What was really new for me though, was the fact that every car on the cities street suddenly mutates into a taxi when a foreigner is out and waiting. I was just standing in front of the hotel waiting for Lotta to pick me up and every few seconds I heard " taxi ? taxi ? " and that regardless of the car that was passing by. Okay, on milltary car passing > they didn't say anything and neither did I. Most of the cars on the road are pickup trucks made in by Japanese Companies.
Freedive dahab is located at the Jasmina Hotel which is not the one where I am staying so I was glad for the ride since I didn't know the right way yet.
Lotta is doing training dives with me and Anton from Russia. He is from Moskow and trains with some other russian freedivers. But his English is not really good so he did not take a regular course. And I am mostly here to see what it is like to freedive in the Red Sea and how my body copes with it.
A big issue is dehydration. You have to drink much more water than you are normally used to and it's still not enough. The effect is that after a day of freediving and being out in the desert you get really tired and maybe even have a headache. Equalization may also get worse.
So you see us running around with 1,5 Liter Bottles of Water. Too still boost that you can get some extra rehydraton powder at the pharmarcie.
This is a good example of how the local ecomnomy is working here. As far as Lotta heard the phamarcie can not charge more than the official price for the medicine which is 2,5 egyptian pounds. That price is even written on the package. But if you walk into the pharmacie as a tourist you will get charged more. A customer of Lotta's got charged ten egytian pounds and when I asked myself for it at another pharmacie as a test I heard 5 egyptian pounds. When Lotta was arguing with guy on the counter I said she will get "special prices" but others won't. When a talk with the police was suggested, he just said, that he has got no problem with the police or America. We don't know what America has got to do with this but the guy had to get the point through that he hates America, probably because of their low prices for medicine.
Dahab is very nice at night when the lights are switched on and you can stroll along the beachfront where you will find restaurants where you can leisurely dine while listening to the surf.
It was very rough out there and also very windy which I heard is normal.
Money can be changed at a bank or pulled from a maschine that acceptes credit cards and Maestro cards.
Tomorrow I'll write more about the blue hole.
best wishes
Holger
