Dahab '08

Almost 3 weeks ago now I was sat in Manchester Airport at around 5am having left Sheffield at 3, opting to shun sleep in favor of a Halo 3 marathon as by the time we had packed (to the good lady's satisfaction I might add) it was already midnight.Sat there in the gate I started to get very edgey, everyone milling about was fake tan tangerine and sporting either a football shirt or a Juicy Couture tracksuit (first worn by that classy lady Jodie Marsh). Surely these people weren't destined for a week or two of whipping around windsurfing? After what was possibly the most cramped flight I've ever been on, listening to a soundtrack of screaming children over the top of Dobbin's latest mix recommendation on my ipod my fears increased. Straight out of the airport I was handed a load of flyers for the ministry of sound (sporting an open air foam party, MMmmm nice). Kicking myself and making a new resolution to do more research before booking holiday, my fears lifted as the orange brigade marched off in one direction as a Nielson holiday shepherd ushered my another.
An hours bus ride ,a lot of dust, rubbish and a load of check points later, all manned by a young guy with an AK47 we passed through another guarded gate and into the resort and the scenery changed. Nielson have created an odd place here, surrounded by a dusty waste land and a whole lot of nothingness they've managed to build a resort surrounded by lush green grass and trees.

Nat on the beach.

The hotel was basic and the food although not amazing certainly wasn't bad the only bug bear I really had was that they tried to screw you over for water by charging £2.00 for a 1.5 ltr bottle (that was soon rectified by running through the gate house with cases of water bought from the local town as the guards chased us to seize the offending goods).
I won't bore you with all the details and a blow by blow account of the fortnight, just a few noteworthy points.
We were very lucky, 1 or 2 days before we arrived a load of containers that had been held up in Cairo for 3 months also showed up. They contained replacement everything. New dinghies, new boards, new rigs, new harness's the LOT and all of this it turns out is worth a scary amount of money.

There were four aisles like this!

The flies in Dahab are persistent, the local shopkeepers even more so.
It is impossible to spend more than £20 on a 3 course meal for two, we tried ordering mountains of fresh sea food but it never broke that magical 200 L.E.
In week one our group was made up of overweight mothers, jail bait teens who chose to windsurf in bikini top's and booty cut jean shorts under a wet t-shirt, a very studenty student, Nat and I and was 25 strong. By the end of week one only four of us remained and made the cut for RYA level 1. However Nat the student and I made headway into more complex things such as beach starts etc.
The group for week 2 was about 12 strong and as it was classified as "Intermediate Non-planing" everyone had actually decided that they liked the sport and progress was swift. The week was spent improving our tacking and gybing, re-doing beach starts for those that hadn't done them, deep beach starts, water-starts and then using the harness.

My first deep beach start

By the end of the first two days the whole group was planing which was seriously astounding the instructor. After this (as you get days off) Nat and I spent the rest days on the water and ended up pretty much with 1 to 1 tuition, the instructor we got (being Egyptian) was confused as to which group we were in and spent the day teaching us duck gybe's and helitacks which are slightly more advanced, we cracked the duck gybe but the helitack (being the first real freestyle move you learn) evaded us, the whole getting back winded and being on the wrong side of the sail just led to being catapulted violently in various directions.


On the last day the instructor encouraged us to be brave, smaller board, bigger sail. Oh, it was also very windy. I had a massive smile on my face as I was planing along in the harness at high speed with shoals of fish shooting beneath my board. I don't really know how to liken it to climbing but its a similar feeling when you're skiing, really smooth and really fast in nice conditions. We were warned in week 1 that once you get planing you'll get addicted, it's true. Another freestyle move went down on the final day, the boomerang, turn into the wind and throw your sail forward and down, it shoots back to your hand like a boomerang and bang, you're off!
As we didn't leave until 1:30pm on the last day and it was a free-sail day, Nat and I got up early, so early in fact that we had the water to ourselves. We managed to squeeze in a good few hours of blasting around until my hands fell to bits and we called it a day. It was a bit depressing to finally sign the equipment back in.
By the end of the two weeks we both managed to get our RYA level 2 and are well on the way to level 3, the whole group as we said previously were planing! Nat and I also received the group award and were urged NOT to quit due to the swift rate of progress.

Nat in the middle

The journey back was boring and uneventful but thankfully Nat had the Friday off so it wasn't straight back to work. We picked up our bags at the airport and wandered down to the station just in time to watch a Sheffield train disappear. The next train was nearly three hours later which made me curse taking the slightly cheaper option. Sitting around doing nothing when you're tired is just rubbish.
So now we're back and still keen on getting back out on the water sometime soon, despite the obvious differences, we're not exactly in a great location which means travel, add to that the cost of renting equipment and things start getting pricey but nowhere near the cost of buying equipment. Second hand, one board and rig similar to that which we were using the previous week costs £1057 and add to that you need another couple of sails, wet suit, harness..
The car tried to upset me last weekend. "Engine Failure" warning light. Nat and I cursed its Italian nature, a few days later I decided to give it a check over and my cursing turned to my other half. A quick top up of water and the over dramatic Italian was silenced.


One more thing - Oakleys don't float unfortunately.

Glossary if anyone cares:

Duck Gybe:

Helitack: