In the Red Sea

FRIDAY 29th

I said yesterday I would go in the water today. I had a dream during the night where I entered the water by one of the buoyed channels and just as I was about to "take off " an octopus came and wrapped its tenticles around one of my legs pulling me further out to sea. Naturally I began to shout for help and told myself not to panic, but panic I did. I don't remember the outcome!

As promised by the watersports team the weather was perfect with ideal conditions to suit my incompetence. I chose to enter the water by the short jetty further up the beach and where I could see the water was shallower because a woman was stood up to her waist. I prepared myself for snorkelling before entering the water so climbing down the ladder in fins was not an easy task. The water came up to my chest, which was a bit of a shock, as I stood to place my mask in a comfortable position. Without having to go very far I saw a wide variety of fish, pipe, rainbow wrasse, angel, dark blue thin flat fish with a large bright yellow spot, hundreds of small fish darting in and out of the colourful coral. I also spotted a very large fish under an overhang and moved back to get a better view. A sudden movement and then panic on my part as I saw a very large octopus moving along the coral and then swimming right by me, so close I could have touched it. I was still close to the end of the jetty where an English couple were sat with their feet dangling over the side. When I got out of the water the man was so excited at seeing the octopus he said it had made his holiday. They laughed when I told them of my dream! Keith had made his way over the reef back to the larger jetty and was sitting on the sun bed when I returned. He hadn't seen an octopus but had seen some very large fish of different varieties. Still I was very happy and keen to return. I waited until I had warmed up again and then back in the sea I was lucky to see a large brown and white lion fish, with large fan like fins in a crevice. I lay there hoping it would come out even though I knew it was poisoness. I could not believe my eyes as next to it was another octopus. How I wished I had got an underwater camera - what a picture an octopus and lion fish in the same frame.

We took a late lunch and then went for a walk along the stretch of beach to the 'Club Med' building site. We were not impressed other than it will be sheltered from the wind. Some of the older buildings looked furnished by most of the place is still under construction. We wondered how the lorries gained access to the place as we could see no signs of a roadway.

Returning to our complex we did more exploring, passing over a dried up river bed where we stopped on the bridge to do a spot of birdwatching. It seems to be the making season and the blalck headed birds with hellow underparts are pairing up. We watched one doing it's mating routine but saw no takers! We discovered the tennis courts and next to it the plant centre with plenty of empty plant pots but not many new plants growing.

When it was time to eat we arrived at the 'Limoncello' the same time as a party of 45 Jordanians. Our 'girl' was full of apologies for the lack of dining space as she escorted us to the overflow dining room to be seated amongst several tables of ladies and children - not a Jordanian man in sight! It was not a problem for us as we kept telling staff and I quite enjoyed seeing the ladies dressed in traditional and western clothes feeding their children. It was a good opportunity to see how they eat some of the unusual foods. One curly headed little boy made us laugh when on finishing his bowl of soup he got up from the table and took the bowl through the door marked 'Service'. He could easily have gone through the door marked 'toilets'. We said hello to him on his return. He came to our table with a cold chip dipped in tomato sauce and handed it to me whilst wanting to shake my hand. Not to be left out he went to get Keith an even bigger chip with more tomato sauce on it! The family seemed to enjoy the encounter. Management apologised yet again and invited us to take lunch on them at the 'Al Fresco' restaurant at lunchtime tomorrow.

Once again it was a lovely night so we remained on our balcony until late.