(Nomad: Day 1377)
Dahab, South Sinai, Egypt,
Yesterday I walked in the desert. It is actually very practical to stay on the border of the town as I have direct access to the wide Sinai desert right next to me. I did not realize this until the last few days. There is a canyon there, and walking only 15 minutes and it is almost in total silence. The area is very dry and arid. There is not much life around here, flights that arrived in and from Sharm-el-Sheikh are resonating every 15 minutes across the region. The biggest animal one can find is the camel, but not in the wild. Then there are also a lot of errant dogs, they all make such noise when they bark. I don’t think there are many endemic species left around this region, maybe mostly underwater. Nevertheless, I could spot 2 types of bees sprawling over the place, they agglomerate around the few sparse plants that are growing in the canyon. But they are very seldom. I was astonished however to see a variety of plants, more than I would have imagined. The canyons there serve as channels for the water when it rains every 8 years or so and hence form temporary rivers at those times. This is why plants can find what they need to grow in the bed of the canyons. One can also spot trees at times, though it seems there is only one type of tree that successfully can grow here. Small birds can survive these conditions, they make nests in the cavity of the cliff, usually at inaccessible heights, so they are out of danger from predators. It’s interesting to observe all these life forms I could find at a place where I wouldn’t imagine this. I tried to record the bees, however, I had only the Clippy with A10, which is not the best for very quiet sounds.
This morning I woke up early and came back to the desert and tried to record again but with my custom kit and the Sennheiser MKH8090, however in the morning bees are less active, maybe they are still sleeping…
Today I leaving Dahab, to my next destination: Luxor. It will be a long day with bus, taxi, flight, layover, then another flight, and taxi again. A day of transport, noise, patience, staying sit down, and little stress. I wish that tomorrow I will be able to visit the 2 famous temples that lie in the East of the city.
