Freediving with Dolphins

Dolphins in Dahab

We were at Light House today to do some freediving with some students who were finishing a courses, and at the end of it all we spent the better part of the morning freediving with two beautiful Dolphins.  There was a mama Dolphin with a baby swimming on the far side of the bay.  We saw them from a distance at first, but then I decided to take my mask and snorkel and run over to the bridge where we had seen them.  Sure enough the first 10 minutes nothing, but then Wendy, who had also come down to the bridge, spotted them below us.  What an amazing site!  These two beautiful animals just swam around us seemingly undisturbed by the growing crowd.  We spent quite a while with them in the water.  To be honest, I could have spent the whole day there.  I’d have to say that this was one of the best days I’ve ever had freediving at the Light Houses.  Below is a picture of the same situation somewhere not in Dahab.  They are the same dolphins though.  Unfortunately this was the one day we didn’t have a camera with us. 

Dahab Wind Storm

The winds of Dahab

Just a few days ago a wonderful event occurred here in Dahab that provided a great deal of entertainment for Dahab locals as well as a lot of extra work and stress for restaurant owners.  The famed south winds of the red sea showed there face on Dec 11^th and made an amazing mess of both the blue hole and the light houses diving area.  We had some courses running at the time and were on our way to Nirvana dive club to meet our students when we noticed that there was something not quite right with the way the wind was blowing.  As we approached the lighthouses there was an enormous amount of mist falling on us.  I asked Katya “Is it raining”, but just then someone close by heard my question and relied that the waves were so big they were creating a mist that was raining in on the parking lot.

We walked our way through the parking lot to the beach and what we saw was indeed interesting.  Massive waves were crashing into all the manmade structures on the beach creating an impressive sceptical.  The spray from the waves was shooting into the air 10 meters or so and completely destroying all the structures on the beach.  If it wasn’t for the stone walls that were built on the beach most of the waves would have simply rolled out and done no damage at all.  I guess thanks to all the restaurant owners for putting money into these walls so as to provide hours of entertainment for all us Dahab locals twice a year, when the wind comes and crashes into the beach.

Needless to say that we didn’t do any diving that day;  There were some Russian scuba divers that decided to brave the waves but had a hard time getting out of the water after the dive.  There was also one Egyptian man that tried to save one of the many fishing boats that sank.  He nearly died when a large wave flipped the boat on top of him.  Some people pulled the guy out of the water but the boat didn’t make it.  He suffered a broken leg, but was very lucky not to have lost his life.  In spite of all the antics it was something quite nice to watch; and though we didn’t finish our courses that day, our students got to enjoy watching the power of mother nature tearing apart the beach at Light House.

Dean Spahic

World of Freediving