Charming Sharm: Visiting Egypt’s Resort City

Despite arriving Sharm El-Sheikh around midnight very tired and exhausted, one was still very much conscious and enchanted by the picturesque nature of the city. Driving from Sharm El-Sheikh International Airport in the middle of the night to our Hotel, the incredible nightlife of Sharm was clearly visible. The beautifully lit palm trees and neon […]

Despite arriving Sharm El-Sheikh around midnight very tired and exhausted, one was still very much conscious and enchanted by the picturesque nature of the city.

Driving from Sharm El-Sheikh International Airport in the middle of the night to our Hotel, the incredible nightlife of Sharm was clearly visible. The beautifully lit palm trees and neon lighting welcome visitors to the city at night.

And as we drove to Aurora Hotel which is about 10km from the airport, the charming Sharm caught our attention at one of the turning points.

And many visitors would not but agree at the description of the city as charming. A quiet and serene city during the day, the allure of the city could best be felt at night with the city’s bustling night life.

Sharm El-Sheikh literally known as Bay of the Sheikh is an Egyptian city on the southern part of the Sinai Peninsula, in South Sinai Governorate, which is the least populated governorates in Egypt according to our tour guide. With a population of less than 100,000, Sharm El-Sheikh is located on the coastal strip along the Red Sea and it is the administrative hub of the Governorate, which includes other smaller towns such as Dahab and Nuweiba.

It is home to exciting desert landscape and covered by dunes and majestic mountains. It is known for its rich diving sites from the protected area of Ras Mohamed on the southern tip of the peninsula up to the east coast of the Tiran reefs in the Gulf of Aqaba.

Though small in population, the city is one of the most frequently visited tourist sites in Egypt. Described also as Egypt’s resort city, major attractions to visitors are the many enchanting resorts and holiday destinations that provide a bespoke ambience for families and individuals looking for relaxation.

After a tour of the many tourist sites in Cairo, the Egyptian capital, during a fam trip organized for some tour operators in Nigeria by Egypt Air, no other place provides a more befitting ambience for relaxation than Sharm El-Sheikh.

The two-day stay in Cairo saw the visitors, comprising many tour operators and travel managers, visiting many tourists sites including the Old Coptic Cairo comprising the Hanging Church, Bablonia Fort and St. George Nunnery all in the old Cairo where the Holy Family stayed according to historical and biblical accounts.

It however took a one-hour flight from Cairo to arrive Sharm El-Sheikh International Airport after which we headed straight to Aurora Oriental Resort.

The resort is one of Egypt’s top holiday destinations on the Red Sea surrounded by some of the world’s most beautiful beaches and dive sites. The city has a combination of Sea and Desert which are the desire of many tourists.

Sharm’s major industry remains the tourism business and nothing more. It is for them a booming one and a major revenue earner. Depending on the package a tourist pays for, the routine in Sharm has never changed. The beaches at many of the resorts are full of tourists during the day while the night is reserved for party. “This is a city that never sleeps,” says Sabah, our tour guide.

Aurora Resort located 12 km from Sharm El Sheikh Airport has facilities such as three swimming pools, two children pools, private sandy beach, squash courts, one tennis court, Darts, Boccia and Billiard, Kids Club, animation Team, among others. All the other resorts in Sharm including Shores Golden,  Marina Sharm provide an all-inclusive service especially for families on vacation.

What to do in Sharm?

Like it was described as a city that never sleeps, the city bubbles day and night. The nightlife was more electrifying with music blasts from all corners.

In the day, the many resorts surrounded by lush palm trees, rich landscaping and scenic views over the mountains have some of the most attractive sandy beaches with a relaxing view of the sea. But depending on the choice, the day is also for those with the love of water to spend time inside the swimming pool or recline on the many couches at the poolside.

But for the adventurous, there are other activities like windsurfing, kitesurfing, parasailing, canoeing, among others that make the visitor’s stay in the resort absolutely amazing.

Egypt Air’s subsidiary, Karnak which organizes and coordinates several activities like the city tour, conferences, and many others took us round many resorts in Sharm which boast of the same features and facilities. They have mastered the act of packaging a bespoke vacation all year round though October/March is said to be the best time to visit with temperature of 18-28 degree Celsius.

An official tour guide said, “Coming to Egypt without visiting Sharm which we refer to as the city of peace and tranquility, your tour is incomplete. From day one, depending on the tour package paid for by families or individuals, you can’t get bored in Sharm El-Sheikh. This place offers a peaceful vacation in the nature.”

Safari trips

The trip to the Safari took us about 30 minutes and on arrival at the desert, quad bikes were already positioned waiting for us to begin the quad bike adventure. Prior to leaving our Hotel for the Safari, everybody had been advised to get a sunglass and a Arabian wrapper to cover the face against dust during the quad biking.

There were other activities like horse riding, camel riding, paragliding, among others. But the quad bike adventure was thrilling. Racing in group in the safari was more than fun as we were led by some of the operators of the safari until we got behind the hills where we shouted LAGOS for the mountain to echo.

We drove on to the next stop where we had dinner with Bedouins with scintillating entertainment especially the performance of the belly dancer.

And like some of the tour operators observed, Sharm is a relatively peaceful city with no fear of insecurity from any quarters. Even at night people go about their normal businesses. Foreigners throng the city virtually every hour for holiday and vacation. The Italians, the Russians, the Indians, and many other nationals of other countries come often to enjoy the holiday offerings of the city.

The Nigerian visitors did not come only to see the many amazing resorts, they were awed in disbelief of how Egypt has turned around its tourism sector. In Egypt, Tourism reportedly accounts for 12 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) which is a significant contribution to the country’s economy.

For Nigeria to develop its tourism industry and propel it to contribute significantly to GDP, observers believe there must be ample investment in promotional and packaging activities to make the various national tourist sites attractive to visitors from around the world. The key thing as suggested by the tour operators as no foreigner would be disposed to visiting tourist sites where he would be kidnapped, attacked or maimed.

Alhaji Saleh Rabo, Managing Director, All State Travels and Tours, President of Federation of Tourism Association of Nigeria said he was marveled at how Egypt developed its tourism industry.

He said, “I come to countries like this and I see what they have and how they run the tourism industry, it really beats my imagination. I believe that we have a lot that we can offer as a country. I think my experience here has been very awesome, a wonderful experience.

“From the cultural aspect of Egypt, which is what we saw in Cairo, their history, they are a country that has a lot of history. Now we came to Sharm El-Sheikh which is now a creation, a Resort. You can see the whole of this place was built as a tourism resort and you can see the kind of people that it is attracting.”

Rabo said for the country to develop the sector, there must be very good security which would make the tourists want to stay more.

He added, “What I have noticed here is that there is very good security. Everybody is free, everybody is comfortable going about his business especially in the night.

“What I have learnt from this is that for you to have a very good and thriving business, you need stability in terms of security, in terms of power and then accessibility also because It is important you have access to all these tourist sites and then you are secured when you get to the tourist sites, you enjoy yourself and the sky is your limit.

You can see how Egypt is leveraging on the advantage they have with their very rich history and natural resources and they are exploring it to the best of their ability.”

“Nigeria, as a country, has a lot to learn on this because we have similar historical sites, we have natural resources that God has given us. We have very good weather too that we can leverage on. I think all we need to do is packaging. If we are able to package ourselves, put things together, Nigeria would become one of the most visited places in the world.”

The stakeholder urged Nigeria to fine-tune its tourism policy as a deliberate measure to grow the industry which still underperforms in all ramifications.

Rabo said: “Nigeria has a tourism policy just that the tourism policy has not been utilized. When you have policies that overtime you have not utilized them, you need to make some changes in them. I think what we need to do is make some changes in the tourism policies that we have. We already have a Nigerian tourism policy, it is there lying down. It is on the archives there. You look at it, polish it and then come up and then understand where we do have comparative advantage. What can we leverage on as a country and sell.

“As a tourism expert, one of the things we have is our culture because Nigeria is very rich, diverse. From the South, the middle best, the North, the East, we have very rich culture that we can leverage on, develop and be able to attract people to come to Nigeria.

“We have a lot of natural resources too because of our location. You can see we have very fine beaches too at the coast. At the Middle Belt, we have savannah and up North too, Nigeria has a lot. All we need is to package them and then have good security, create accessibility to these sites because if you don’t have accessibility, it is a big problem. Then we need to stabilize power because some of these places, you can’t run them on generator. Tourism is multifaceted, it is a combination of all the Ministries, Agriculture, aviation, works, immigration, there needs to be a synergy among all these organs so that together we all understand what we want to achieve and together we all achieve a standard tourism industry in Nigeria.”