Asian Egypt

Just three and a half years later I'm back in Egypt, this time in the small Asian part of this intercontinental country. For while it is true that Egypt is rightly considered an African state, since its capital, its main cities and the vast majority of its land area and population are in Africa, it is also true that the Sinai peninsula is located in Asia. The Suez Canal divides the two continents. I'm travelling with a friend and we arrive in the evening at Sharm el-Sheikh airport after a technical stop in Luxor. At Sharm a minibus is waiting to take us to the far north of Sinai, to Taba, a resort town on the border with Israel. We arrive late in the evening, just in time to eat a sandwich and go to bed. Our resort is called Swiss Inn Dream; as the name suggests it belongs to a Swiss hotel chain and was recently opened.

Some wings of the hotel are still to be finished and the gardeners are completing the gardens. We find all this out the next day, along with the fact that the resort is actually quite nice: it has a scenic fountain, a lovely pool and a private beach with sun loungers and straw-roofed umbrellas. After meeting our travel assistant we take advantage of the fine sunny day and head to the beach. The golden sand is fine, but at the water's edge and in the water there are rather annoying stones. We dive into the Red Sea anyway, taking care not to hurt ourselves on the stones on the seabed. We then prefer to use the pool; the water temperature is more than acceptable, even though it's November. The resort restaurant offers Arab cuisine and a few international dishes served buffet-style; there's a good assortment of desserts, including baklava in numerous versions.

The biscuits are very pleasant too, while I don't dare try the fresh fruit and yoghurt. The first day passes between a swim and a bit of relaxation in the sun. The next morning we join a bus excursion with many Italians taking part. We cross the stony desert of Sinai, characterised by numerous mountains completely bare of vegetation, whose prevailing colours range between ochre and pink depending on the sunlight. We head south, then at the height of Dahab we turn inland and stop at a point where the stony desert seems to give way to a vast sandy area. Here we are approached by Bedouin vendors trying to sell some useless trinkets. We then resume our journey, stopping at the foot of Mount Sinai, the summit climbed by Moses to meet God. In the middle of this desolate desert, at the foot of the imposing biblical mountain, stands the fortified Monastery of Saint Catherine.

A thick ring of walls leads into the monastic complex, where we visit the church, the well of Moses and what tradition holds to be the burning bush described in Exodus. There is also a small museum with very ancient icons and a manuscript of Muhammad who passed through here. Not far away is an ossuary preserving the bones and skulls of monks, and the tomb of Aaron, Moses's brother, whose body was however moved by a sultan to near Petra in Jordan. The monastery holds one of the most important collections of manuscript books, but unfortunately it is not accessible to the faithful. The church bell tower contrasts effectively with the rugged walls of Sinai. Once outside the fortifications we climb a mountain so as to observe and photograph the monastery in its entirety, together with its truly unusual surroundings.

Once the visit is over we take the bus for a short stretch to a nearby inn where we have a buffet lunch. We then take the return road, this time by minibus, because our excursion and that of four other Italians includes a short stop in the town of Dahab, a well-known seaside resort famous for its seabeds. There's only time for a stroll along the seafront, full of little tourist shops, dive centres and agencies organising desert excursions. On the other shore of the Red Sea the profile of the Saudi Arabian heights is clearly visible. We get back on the minibus and return to our resort in Taba for dinner. The following day we set off from here on a Cairo excursion, a city I had already visited three and a half years earlier. On this occasion too there are only a few of us, so we have to face the long journey by minibus, faster but definitely less comfortable than a coach.

From Taba the road runs for many kilometres to the Suez Canal, near which we stop at a place to eat the breakfast pack provided by the hotel. We take the chance to stretch our legs after hours of driving on a badly maintained road with potholes, bumps and frequent checkpoints. We get back on the minibus and cross the Canal through an underpass, leaving Asia and entering Africa (see the Cairo itinerary). We return from Cairo via the same underpass that crosses the Suez Canal and continue the long road to Taba, where we arrive utterly exhausted, just in time for dinner. Fortunately no transfers are planned for the following day; we stay in our resort, set between the harsh desert mountains and the Red Sea in a truly strategic spot, the Gulf of Aqaba, on which four countries look out within just a few kilometres: Egypt, Israel, Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

When night falls, from the beach you can see the lights of every country in the gulf, though those coming from Aqaba in Jordan and Eilat in Israel seem to belong to a single city, so close are they. The next day we set off on an excursion to Petra; the bus takes us, together with other Italians, to a small nearby tourist harbour where a ferry waits to take us to Jordan (see the relevant itinerary). We return in the evening just in time for dinner. Only a few hours' sleep and then back on the bus with many fellow countrymen; this time we get off at the border with Israel, which we'll cross on foot (see the relevant itinerary). On the way back from Israel the bus will still be there waiting to take us back to the hotel for dinner. After the meal we don't go to bed, because at 1.30 a minibus comes to pick us up to take us to Sharm el-Sheikh, from where we set off to return to Italy.

A few notes: the resort is lovely but isolated; it's not part of a hotel complex, and wherever you want to go in the surroundings you'll have to take a taxi and pass through numerous checkpoints. The restaurant serves reasonably well, but its opening hours are limited. If you come back late from an excursion you'll get your meal in your room, but it's inedible. Inedible too is what you'll find in the so-called travel baskets. The basket, moreover, consists of a light cardboard box that will break during the journey. There's practically no entertainment. In November it's hot but pleasant, though unfortunately the days are short and by 5 pm it's dark. At the Monastery of Saint Catherine it's much hotter than on the coast.