Snorkeling in The Red Sea, aka facing my Apheichthyophobia

This entry is about Day 13, Monday 12/13

Today I had one of the greatest experiences of my life; snorkeling in the Red Sea.

We woke up early for breakfast and left for the boat around 8:30am. About 30 of us, including Prof. Ghaly, drove a couple of minutes from the hotel to get to the dock with the boat we would be spending our day out in the sea on. Once on the boat we were told we would be stopping at 3 choral reefs during the day, and be served lunch; did I mention that everything only cost $20 for the day?!

The first stop was Paradise Island and we were taken to the shore with a small boat. Did I mention that the weather in the past few days has been SO COLD?! So yea, we knew snorkeling was going to be rough with the wind and whatnot. Once we got into the water with our flippers and masks, the water was actually very warm and pleasant. Once we swam out a couple of meters, we were right above these amazing choral reefs full of beautiful tropical fish; if you didn’t know this, I have a phobia of fish getting very close to me/touching me, so I was really facing one of my biggest fears by doing all of this. Luckily, the fish never came extremely close to us and we were able to look down at everything. It was all pretty amazing and I had never done anything like this before. After doing this for about an hour or so, we were FREEZING when we got out!

Finally we made it back onto the boat for lunch; swimming makes me so hungry, I was completely stuffing my face! Next we made it to our second location, which was right in the middle of the sea. This time we jumped right off the boat rather than walking in from the beach. The water was much deeper here, and the choral was much bigger and colorful. It was pretty surreal being in this environment. I hate to admit it, but I was having a mini panic-attack in this spot because the fish were swimming all around me at one point. I was freaking out for a bit, but eventually made it back to the boat without anyone really noticing. Besides the minor setback, I was really glad I was able to get myself in the water and that the fear didn’t stop me from living and experiencing an amazing site.

The third stop was right after the second one. Unfortunately I was so tired at this point, not to mention at this location the fish were swimming right up to the boat, so I sat out for this round of snorkeling. The snorkeling as a whole was so great; I’m really glad I did it. I was so amazed at how much I enjoyed it that I bought a video of our experience (not to mention it was the first time I had ever done this, and I figured it was worth $25). The whole day was so much fun, and I was nice being on a boat all day. It would have been even better if it was hot out, but it was an amazing environment and experience.

The Coldest Day of Relaxation

This entry is about Day 12, Sunday 12/12

Today was the first day I was able to completely relax for an entire day. I woke up early around 7am (without an alarm waking me up) and went to another buffet breakfast, which is always my favorite. Ben, Ceillie, Shelby, and I all went to the beach around 10ish and laid out on the beach (reminder that it is the Red Sea! So cool!). Unfortunately it was very windy, and even when directly in the sun it was very cold. We only stayed outside for a few hours. Eventually we packed up and went to lunch, where Ceillie, Shelby, and I had cheeseburgers (don’t judge me I was craving red meat!). They were pretty good considering how hungry we were. We all spent the afternoon napping (catching up on the many hours we haven’t slept during the week) and eventually woke up for dinner.

Dinner was the usual: lots of carbs, and a little bit of cheese. After dinner a bunch of us went outside the hotel to see what kind of shopping was around, but it was the same thing we’ve been seeing everywhere else; scarves, perfume, hookahs, etc. Every person was hassling us so we only stayed out for about 20 minutes. When we went back to the hotel we got hot chocolate to warm up from the cold. I’m not going to complain about the cold though because I know it is so much colder at home in New York. I’m about to go to sleep early because we have to wake up early for snorkeling tomorrow morning!