"I have just what you are looking for" or doing just about nothing by the Red Sea

     Marinating would be the proper descriptor for what we did while on the Sinai peninsula. We parked ourselves in a dirt cheap, incredibly spartan hotel room a stones throw away from the beach, and did mostly nothing for about a week. It was a delight, I will not write too much because there is a person smoking a poop flavored cigarette next to me and I want to run away.

Each afternoon when we rolled out of bed we would walk down to the local falafel stand and order a "mixed falafel sandwich" which consisted of two pita breads, hummus, cucumber, tomato, lettuce, beans, green chili, garlic mashed potatoes, falafel, scrambled eggs, and tahina (sesame paste). Needless to say, one sandwich satiated us for most of the day.

View of the Red Sea from near our hotel. You can see Saudi Arabia in the distance. The water was crystal clear.  After a leisurely lunch on some pillows in the shade we would walk down to the water a swim around a little. We bought a snorkel mask and would dive a bit too, you can see at least 60 feet in the water with the most incredible reef and fish all around. 

We we situated in the shadow of Mount Sinai as the backdrop to our oceanic retreat.

There was a lovely boardwalk in town that was home to a gaggle of overpriced restaurants ( at least to our standard).  It was fun to walk around there as there was a lot going on and we were constantly being told that the owner of the restaurant had exactly what we were looking for.

The area that we were in suffers from ambitious developmental issues. Everywhere along the coast are the not ancient remains of failed hotels and beach resorts. Walking away from the strip is like walking into some post apocalyptic world with concrete remains of some better past littering the beach. 

We walked to the next, not so touristed town, from where we were staying and found a small restaurant that was serving fresh fish from the fish mongers next door. For about 15 dollars we had an amazing meal. We were given roasted eggpant, baba ganoush, Salad, and hummus to start. 

Then we were given spiced rice and a whole fresh grilled grouper to share. The fish weighed like 2 pounds and was uber good.

We developed a small addiction to ho-hos while lounging by the beach. The shop next to our place kept a substantial stock of them at a whopping 10 cents a piece.

Thus ended our glutonous and slothful season by the red sea.