Red Sea: where to stay and who to dive with?

[annlaur]

Never been to Aqaba, so can't comment on the diving and life there, but it's a great location if you want to go visit Petra.
According to what I've read on the Internet, day trips to Petra from either Sharm or Dahab cost at least 200 euros a person and take over 15 hours, most of them spent travelling by bus and ferry.
So if you're planning on visiting Petra, it might be worth comparing airfares and deciding to stay in Aqaba.

Another option is to book a cheap flight and hotel package to Hurghada, spend a day there, then take the ferry to Sharm (about 2 hours and 40 dollars one way, I think), and heading to Dahab (if you book a hotel in Dahab ahead of time and ask them to pick you up, they should charge you around 25 euros per person for this. Or you can take a local bus).
Spend a few days in Dahab then go back to Hurghada the same way and do some boat dives.

This way you get to visit both places, do both boat and shore dives, and possibly save money (as you know in France all inclusive trips to Hurghada are often cheaper than just a flight ticket to Sharm).

Bon voyage. PM me in either French or English if you want more info.
Anne-Laure

 

[Jack Tripp]

Well we requested advice and decided to go with the consensus and had a brilliant week. We stayed at the Hilton, Dahab and dived with Reef 2000. Organised the trip with Regaldive and flew Thompson. The diving we organised ourselves.
The hotel was very good and the staff were brilliant. The only slight fault found was with their sea food restaurant: it does not live up to its publicity; the food was bland.
Reef 2000 is a great dive centre and thanks to all the staff (especially Å*ittle and Å£ig Mohamed who were excellent dive guides). The Bedouin Moon hotel is obviously a great place if you are there in a group, to just dive but the advantage of the Hilton was that it had much more atmosphere when not diving and our non diver was very happy to be left on the beach (literally) at the hotel. The hotel was full to capacity while we were there but we were surprised to discover this as due to the layout and design it was never giving the impression of being crowded.
Did all the signature dives and they each turned out to be exactly what was said on the packet. The weather was very pleasant and the sea temp at 23 degrees warranted the 5mm semi dries and hoods we dived in.
Ultimate test: would we go again? Most definitely ÅÚes if we want a nice diving break in winter.
Jack Tripp.