Day 16 Sharm el Sheikh to St. Catherine's and Mount Sinai

Day 16 – Sharm el Sheikh to St. Catherine’s and Mount Sinai

Today we woke up at the resort in Sharm. It was finally a day to sleep in. We were a bit confused on when someone was picking us up for the ride to St. Catherine’s but someone did finally call us to set up a time of 2pm. Check out time was noon so we just put our bags in the storage room and sat by the pool and read our books.

At 2pm, we went to the lobby and were pleasantly surprised that our driver, Josef, from Cairo was there to drive us. Even though he drives really fast, we really enjoyed his company. He doesn’t speak English all that well but he is a very pleasant man. We were also accompanied by 3 other men. One is named Makmut. He is our guide. Another one didn’t introduce himself and we found out later that he is a representative for the tour company. He comes along just to make sure we get across border crossings and get checked in at hotels, etc. The other man was from the tourist police. We didn’t find that out until later. I guess we should have noticed his machine gun.

It was a two-hour drive to our hotel near St. Catherine’s monastery.
During the van ride, Makmut and Scott talked the whole way. He showed us pictures of his kids and his girlfriend. He seems a bit strange but then again, most of this trip could be described as strange. I’m having to remind myself that this is a different country and things are done just a little differently.

The drive was interesting. We basically are driving northwards on the Sinai Peninsula. Sharm is at the southern point of the peninsula. The whole drive was a 2-lane highway surrounded by sand and mountains. I took some video. I hope you can get a sense of what it was like. Basically, there’s not much around.


The hotel “complex” is right in the middle of the sand and mountains. I have a video of the hotel. Originally, we were put in the guides’ quarters. We didn’t realize this until we started walking around. It’s about an acre in size with a reception building, guides’ quarters, a pool and rooms around the pool plus some small shops. Once we saw the rooms around the pool we wanted to move. Our first room had three small beds made out of concrete. It didn’t appear to be very clean. We aren’t travel snobs and certainly don’t stay in 5 star hotels everywhere but we do have at least some standards on where we will stay. This didn’t quite cut it.


Our guide spoke with the man at the reception and he acted like he didn’t have any more rooms available. We sat on the couches and waited for about 5 minutes and were finally given a key to another room. Our new room doesn’t appear to be completely ready for guests but it is much nicer and cleaner. Scott did have to take apart the showerhead and clean it out but we at least have a large double bed and clean towels. And, our room overlooks the pool area with a balcony. It isn’t the resort at Sharm but it is at least passable. We noticed in the lobby that it’s rated 3 stars. I would give it a 1 or 1.5 stars.

I didn’t realize exactly where we were headed this afternoon. Once we stepped out of the van, it felt about 25-30 degrees cooler than what we have been used to. We are actually in the mountains of the Sinai peninsula, near Mt. Sinai. It is 7500 feet high. Mt. Sinai is said to be the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments. It is also said that this is the area where God spoke to Moses from the burning bush.

Tomorrow we will spend our last day in Egypt taking a tour of St. Catherine’s Monastery (Deir Saint Katreen) and then catch a ferry to Jordan.