Safaga – in the Republic of Egypt

Tuesday 16 May – Safaga, founded between 282BC ad 268 BC by Satyrus, it was originally called Philotera in honour of the deceased sister of the Pharaoh Ptolemy II Philadelphus Stephanus of Byzantium.  Safa means particles of sand and Ga means come – and the meaning of Safaga is “Sandstorm has come”.  It was a merchant port for many years and has many phosphate mines, also agriculture and Egyptian cotton.  The town has a small tourism industry due the scuba diving and snorkelling in the Red Sea.

We had a completely different day today, no long coach rides in the heat for us, instead we booked on a Snorkelling in the Red Sea tour.   A relatively small group of us set off for our 4 hours on the sea in a much smaller boat.  We drove through Safaga en route to the dock to pick up our boat, it does seem a bit of a run-down town though and looks to be quite poor, quite dilapidated buildings, and lot of old model cars. 

Soma Bay was the first stop on the snorkelling trip.  It consists of 2,500 acres and is a self-contained community surrounded on all sides by the sea with controlled, private access.  Not that this applied to us as we sailed in!  Fabulous turquoise and navy blue seas and exquisite coral, (very similar to that in French Polynesia and Fiji), in all colours, shapes and sizes.  The second stop was at Tobia al-Hamra, which has a vast coral garden, again with rich and very varied fauna and fish.

 It was lovely to be on the boat and we had such a relaxing morning and great to have such a lovely swim in warm turquoise seas.  Not a lot else worth mentioning really, I flicked off a few photos from the coach as you will see below, but nothing particularly sensational.

However, there was big news tonight……..Geoff and I won the “Name that Tune” Music Quiz!!!!  I’d like to say that the prize was a complimentary cruise for two on any Viking cruise of our choice, but actually it was just a glass of champagne!!!