отдых удался vacation was a success

So, for the 12th time in Egypt!
The hotel was chosen taking into account last year's experience at Akassia Swiss Resort (I will compare with it), which is not far away, but does not have the main thing:
protected house reef, as the main goal is daily snorkeling with photography.

SETTLEMENT - passed according to the frequent scheme:
inspection of the proposed room, a justified rejection of it and getting what you want for baksheesh (gave 40 bucks) - a spacious room on the 1st floor, 2 steps from the sea promenade.
The key card only works in one position:
picture towards you and insert the side where the hand “sticks out”.

TERRITORY - pleasant, without the stink of watering green spaces with wastewater. Surprised (I have not seen anywhere) the presence of built-in speakers near the tracks, from which calm music sounded softly - this undoubtedly added romanticism for evening walks.

CONTINGENT - Europeans. According to concierge Irina, as many as 10 rooms were occupied by Russians (usually 1-2).

TV - 1 Russian, the rest are Arabic and European, including children's with cartoons.
I wanted to adjust the image, but the “menu” button was not pressed (for the first time I encountered this). It was decided simply: I opened the remote control, there was a drop of frozen silicone on the board, which I removed easily.

INTERNET - paid, search in the lobby fixed 3 hotel wireless access points. Didn't work for at least 2 days. In Acassia, I did not encounter such a problem and it was free in the lobby!

BEACH - never lay on it, but it looked pretty decent, 3 working showers.
There was no shortage of free sun loungers either there or by the pools - an infrequent occurrence in the Egyptian "fives"!

POOL - there are several of them on the territory, I sometimes went out to the nearest one (Aqua Bar) on days when I did not snorkel for various reasons.
Pleased with the water in the pool.
After bathing, there was no desire to immediately go to the shower.
And as a rule, it appears, because everywhere in the world (and in Egi, incl.
h. ) do not spare chemistry for disinfection of water in the pool!

FOOD.
There are several places where you can eat or have a bite to eat.
For this purpose, I visited the main restaurant "Shahrazad" and Pergola bar (after 15.00 I ate good meatballs with fries for beer there, if I sacrificed lunch in the interests of the snork).
The previous 3 Egyptian "fives" convinced me that you can't put more than 3 out of 5 points for cooking.
The miracle did not happen this time either.
There is no food.
For 2 weeks of rest, I liked only lentil soup, zucchini with bechamel and a couple more dishes from the evening of Mexican cuisine.
It seems that the Sentido chefs were trained by the same chefs as the Akassia Swiss chefs.
Once, “Russian borscht” was offered here - slurry without cabbage, beets and beans.
"Borscht" just nailed it with a blatant inconsistency with the original, one small sip was enough for me to push this burd aside.
I had a camera with me, I couldn't help but take a picture of it.

To be honest, in the hotels of Sharm and Hurghada they cooked much better, I remember exactly that at dinner I did not limit myself to one typed plate!
As a consolation to the readers, I can say that most likely there will be food that will fit for eating.
And for overweight people, there are much fewer temptations!
What I really liked: good organization in the restaurant.
There were no problems with places, the presence of clean dishes at all, as well as queues for food (for breakfast, 2-3 people for an omelet do not count) - I don’t remember such a pleasant “trifle” for the previous 7 visits to Egypt!
Many times the young waiter Saad served, after understanding my alcohol addiction and 50 pounds - everything was quickly brought to the table without a reminder and in sufficient quantity.
In general, I liked the way the waiters work.
The service was not condescendingly dismissive (until you gave a tip, you are nobody), but politely and with dignity.
That infrequent case when it was not read in the eyes “Come on dangi ...come on dangi! ".

DRINKING WATER.
In the room - 2 bottles of 0.6 in the mini-bar, the cleaner replenishes supplies (sometimes this includes beer).
At lunch and dinner, 1 bottle is placed on the table by default.

SHISHA (HOOKAH) - 2 places for smoking:

1 - in a cafe near Shahrazad.
The hookah was prepared by the bespectacled Mustafa in a white coat (sometimes the waiters, if he was not there).
As soon as I left a tip of 10 bucks for the evening, further service improved noticeably, often he was not limited only to the addition of coal, but brought immediately with fresh tobacco for free.
A common drawback - purely Arabic - is put too much coal at once, and therefore there is a risk of immediately burning tobacco when lighting up. This means that instead of the taste of tobacco, there will be “burnt wool” in the mouth.
The problem is solved simply:
you need to ask for tongs and put extra coal on the “saucer” of the hookah (check that it is dry! ), for refilling.

And so that the hookah man himself does not light up before this - otherwise the nafik will burn everything before you put things in order with the amount of coal.

2 - on the outskirts of the territory, 100 meters from the Mangrove restaurant.
I went in, looked at the interior - there is no furniture, it is offered to smoke lying down or sitting on a mattress.
I arranged with a young hookah maker Midu to bring me a shisha to a lounger on the beach near the restaurant, take a couple of apple juices from the restaurant and smoke with pleasure, looking at the starry sky.
Under the rustle of the surf (or against the background of your favorite music for a smoke).
For me, this is a better option than at ground level in a smoking room.
According to Midou, he does not offer salum to tourists, for them the usual mixtures.
Salum - 5 bucks, it looks like a divorce (well, God bless him), because in another cafe Mustafa interfered with salum without any extra. fees.

ANIMATION etc. P.
To be honest, I'm not interested.
There is nothing to say about daytime animation and the El Lobo disco, because I did not set such a goal or did not hit the time.
As for the evening, previous visits to Egypt have reinforced my belief that evening shows in hotels are a rather pathetic sight, in the vast majority.
That's why he ignored the calls of the animators.

TOURS.
The hotel has stands from the Russian Teza and Pegas Touristik with the usual set of tours.
I really wanted to visit Abu Simbel, but alas, due to the low demand, no one really offered this as part of the group, although it was on the lists of other TOs.
And paying 560 euros there for a prostitute is meaninglessly expensive for me.

Super Luxor from Russian Tez (145 bucks)
I was in those parts 2 times, the last one in 2004, I decided to refresh my impressions and photographic material, especially since the program included 2 new temples (Hathor in Dendera and Khabu) + some kind of banana island.
From the hotel at 4.
15 in the morning (I didn’t bother about dry land, I took only water).
By minibus, an hour to Safaga, then a short wait and transfer to the Tezov bus.
Back in the same way.

These journeys are the most exhausting.
The rest was satisfied.
Photo: http://photo. qip. en/users/a-berg/200610068/

Further information about the possibilities of SNORKLING.

OUTSIDE SNORK.
I bought tours through a hotel Arabic dive center.
Departure from the port of Ghalib on a yacht - 60 euros.
By minibus, snorkel from the shore - 25-35 euros.

ABU SAIL (60 euros)
The reef wall is located about 400 meters south of the Tulip Beach Resort's pontoon.
Highlights: Rockfish, Scorpenopsis, Electric Ray (!! ! ! )
Photo: http://photo. qip. en/users/a-berg/200610313/
Video:
http://www. youtube. com/watch? v=-odNeKUiHRQ
http://www. youtube. com/watch? v=-4sTQtPeVB4

ABU DABBAB (35 euros)
Description of the place in my review of last year's Akassia Swiss Resort
The most interesting: 2 turtles with sticks, a flock of squids, a small cuttlefish.
Tips for fellow hobbyists:
1. See a turtle with a flock of tourists hanging over it - don't fuss.
The main thing is not to miss the ascent of the turtle for a portion of air!
I had 2 such moments in 20 minutes.
And a photo with diving to a depth can be taken after that.

2. If the sea in the bay is not weak (as it was in my case), then this makes the task easier.
And in what sense.
Tourists of different ages mostly rented (or bought) cheap masks and low quality snorkels + inability to use (the mask fogs up, etc. ), you can often see them helplessly jerking their legs without fins.
All this provides them with an uncomfortable, uncertain presence in the water.
And, as a result, unwillingness to linger for a long time in such conditions.
Therefore, be patient, the tourists will fall down - and you will calmly arrange a photo shoot for Tortilla!
Which, in fact, happened.

For the first time I saw fish stuck on the shell of a turtle, and not under it.

Pleased with a small (about 10cm) cuttlefish.
Seeing me, she decided to pretend to be a sandy mound with grass (the cunning woman pulled up 2 tentacles, painting them green).
This did not work and then she changed her image to a typical "flounder" version.

That is, she just tried to merge with the bottom.

Photo: http://photo. qip. en/users/a-berg/115854273/
Video:
http://www. youtube. com/watch? v=F95OXxZAIjo
http://www. youtube. com/watch? v=z1gvAwAQ1iE

MARSA SHOONA & MARSA MOBARAK (60 euros)
Alas, the excitement of the sea that day was simply a record (I had never seen this before).
That could not but affect even the horseshoe-shaped bay MARSA MOBARAK.
The most interesting: blue jellyfish and a meter long barracuda.
According to the guide, there were 2 turtles in the bay, but this time I decided not to swim to them, because the transparency of the water left much to be desired.
Photo: http://photo. qip. en/users/a-berg/115854019/
video: http://www. youtube. com/watch? v=tMBID6eXA4g

After such a stormy day, in the dive center, the Arabs went to meet me:
you can not redeem in the evening, but pay for the tour based on weather conditions in the morning, at a prearranged time. If there is a place in the minibus (as a rule, there is).
The only thing I didn’t like about them was that they often couldn’t say about the next place of the trip until the evening of the previous day, which sometimes made it difficult to plan a vacation.
The Germans in Akassia had no such problem.

SHARM FUGHANI (160 lbs)
For 1.5 hours, divers were brought to Mangrove Bay, which is familiar to me (then they still have to dive on the house reef).
The dive guide told me that this is Sharm Fugani.
Which is not the same as the version of the German dive club in Akassia, the places for snorkeling were different!
Wasted money - there were practically no interesting plots near the wall, and snorkeling in shallow water this time did not work, because it was too shallow.

HOTEL REEF.
Alas, there is no use for him.
Because the current is not sickly, it was necessary to make efforts incompatible with a photohunting snork.
If at 10.16 I started in front of the Pergola beach bar, then by 10.33 I was already blown to the center of the mangroves, a little more - and outside the hotel.

In general, the hotel would not meet my expectations, if not for
WATER AREAS NEAR THE TERRITORY OF PRIVATE VILLAS
next to the hotel.
Formally, you cannot enter this private territory, which is indicated on the sign next to
DC point. There is even a guard on a chair, which, however, does not interfere.
I left the bag at the DC point and swam towards the coastal ledge.
The current gets weaker the closer you get to it.
Dead and living corals, green lawns with "turtle joy" grass.
The first snork in this place pleased no less than in Abu Dabbab!
There were no coral gardens like in Abu Sail or Marsa Mubarak, but there were a lot of objects and situations for shooting!
Stingrays, crocodile fish, sea snake, octopus, even caught kissing fish ....
On the 2nd day, the snork went on foot to the ledge and swam to the right, closer to the inner part of the reef wall, which actually protects the water areas of the hotel and villas from the surf. Here the picture is more interesting, many rays, more beautiful monolithic corals.
It is better to enter at the DC point (there are also reefs opposite there), and to swim - on the contrary, from the ledge to the DC.
It's hard to be ready to shoot all the time.
When crossing to the other side of the coral isthmus, I suddenly saw a 1.5-meter moray eel rushing about 3 meters below me ...which at first reached out to me, but then immediately rushed along the crevice of the reef. If I had been ready for this, it would have been a great photo!
Unfortunately, there were a lot of lost good shots….

General conclusion: quite a decent hotel, I recommend it to my hobby colleagues!

photo: http://photo. qip. en/users/a-berg/200609886/