A low-key town on the Gulf of Aqaba where the diving is world class and nobody is in a hurry.
Dahab is on the east coast of Sinai, about ninety minutes north of Sharm el-Sheikh. It grew out of a Bedouin fishing village and became a backpacker stop before it became anything else.
It is still low-rise, still informal, and the pace is completely different from the resort strips further south.
Almost all the diving here is from the shore. You walk in off the beach or the rocks. That means no boat schedules, no early starts, and a very low barrier between deciding to get in the water and being in it.
The Blue Hole, a few kilometres north, is a famous submarine sinkhole — spectacular for snorkellers around its rim and, for divers, a site that demands respect and honesty about your limits. The Canyon, Eel Garden and the Islands are all excellent shore dives.
The town itself is the other draw. Waterfront cafés with cushions on the floor, mountains behind, and a mixed community of Bedouin families, dive instructors and long-stay visitors. People come for three days and leave after three weeks.
It is also the best base for Mount Sinai and Saint Catherine's, and for the Coloured Canyon and Ras Abu Galum.
Dahab means gold in Arabic, usually taken as a reference to the colour of the sand.
The Bedouin tribes of southern Sinai, principally the Muzeina here, have lived along this coast for centuries, and much of the local tourism economy is still in their hands — particularly the camel routes north to Ras Abu Galum and the Blue Hole.
The reliable water and the sheltered lagoon made this a natural stopping place long before tourism: the villages of Asilah and Mashraba that anchor the modern town began as Bedouin fishing settlements.
Freediving turned Dahab from a backpacker secret into a world capital of the sport. The Blue Hole's depth, warm water and easy shore access made it the training ground where many of the deepest breath-hold dives in history have been attempted, and a year-round teaching community has grown around it.
The town developed slowly and never received the large-scale resort investment that reshaped Sharm and Hurghada, which is precisely why it feels as it does.
Year round. Spring and autumn are ideal; winter evenings are cool; summer is hot but dry.
Opening hours: Not applicable — a town rather than a site.
Opening hours and ticket prices may change. Please confirm the latest details before visiting.
The quietest stretch of the Egyptian Red Sea — house reefs, dugongs and turtles, and very little else.
The southern tip of Sinai — the best shore diving in Egypt, with desert mountains directly behind the beach.
The Red Sea's largest resort town, and the easiest place in Egypt to add a beach week to a Nile itinerary.
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