By simply looking at this picture, an overwhelming flow of memories assaults my mind. From the battle to cross the border in Taba, bargain transportations to Sharm, rest in a sketchy hostel for one night, and finally find this place, the mighty Shark’s Bay, thanks to the Lonely Planet (I love this book), to the epic days and nights we spent here with Ragab, Haram, then Julia, Karim, David, and in the end Lars, everything comes back in my head, as if I was living these happy days once more.

And again, finding such a haven was unexpected. We only knew that we would go to Sharm-el-Sheikh, this touristic destination on the coast, to join Karim and maybe other friends from Cairo. So we headed South from Jerusalem, doing everything we could to get to that “city” – in fact only consisting in an immense network of resorts and hotels so dense it created a town; and after our road trip in Jordan and Israel, we all wanted to chill out, but had no idea of where to go in Sharm.

By some kind of miracle, our guidebook had the answer to all our difficulties. Thank you, Lonely Planet, for transforming a harsh trip into an unforgettable time of my life.

But let us go back to Jerusalem first. After saying goodbye to our Donkey Anthony, we made our way to the Central Bus Station and took a bus back to Eilat, crossing half of the country, along the Dead Sea, in one afternoon.

We took the best taxi ever from Eilat to the Taba border (brand new Mercedes playing some of Tiësto’s best classics), paid once again the fee to exit Israel, and got into the Egyptian border crossing point. Three Egyptian guys instantly popped out of nowhere and started talking to us.

— Let me see your passports. You don’t have the right visa, you need to get one from a travel agency there…

We got saved by a fellow traveler warning us in time that it was a scam. He was actually trying to fight them for hours already, with a friend of his, both being blocked at the border because no custom officer would put the right stamp on their visas – they were all bribed by the con artists.

After that, none of us was in the mood to get ripped off again by a taxi to Sharm. We however found a van, driven by a Bedouin who did not speak a word of English, that accepted to take us to our hotel in Sharm. I mean, the Bedouin accepted, not the van. Whatever, you understood. So we hopped in and got to Sharm, but were dropped in a gas station 20 kilometers away from the city. After an (in)tense bargain, we succeeded in paying only a part to the van (the Bedouin, yeah, I know) and the other one to the taxi bringing us to our Youth Hostel.

If you have ever played Silent Hill, remember how the toilets are in these games. Yes, that’s it, the freaking horrible bathrooms with abominations from hell trying to kill you. This should give you an idea of how Sharm-el-Sheikh’s Youth Hostel is. Without the abominations from hell (actually, I’m not sure about that, we only stayed one night). At least, and I guess it is the most important, the rooms were clean.

It is thus not a surprise if I tell you that we immediately looked for another place to sleep in the morning. After hours of wandering, asking to all the motels around if they had any room available, we decided to look into the Lonely Planet once more (that was were we found the Youth Hostel – soulless but the cheapest in Sharm; we had no idea it was this soulless). The second entry, the Lonely Planet’s pick up, was a bit far from downtown Sharm, but the description of Shark’s Bay Umbi Diving Village was most attractive. We hired a cab and moved to what would become our best playground.

What seemed to be the nearest, and coolest coffee shop around was the Spider Coffee. Ragab was there, as if he had always been waiting for us to come. Not only a very friendly guy, he also came snorkelling with us in the sea and decided to teach us Arabic… And he did (well at least a few words). The day after, we met Haram, also working at the place. During the second night, tired of being eaten alive by mosquitoes in the hut, Matt and I spent the whole night at the Spider Coffee – Haram was there, wanting to stay awake for no apparent reason. Playing Spider Solitaire and serving us Bedouin teas and sheeshas before breaking a jar only to skim… jar pieces? on water with us in the morning seemed to be enough for him.

They would become our hosts for the whole following week, and I think I will never forget these days and nights; we tried every possible spot in the awesome sitting area, listened to every possible song on the computer’s playlist (we kinda knew every Bob Marley song by heart after that) and damn, had so many sheeshas it’s almost shameful to say.

At last, our friends arrived: Julia, Karim and David, freshly coming from Cairo to join us for the Feast holidays. I can’t even write down what happened next – too many memories. Sleeping on the beach, or as seven in a room, going to Na’ama Bay to get some booze, getting Julia to jump into the water even though she was scared of fishes (!) and sharks, chilling out at the Spider coffee, swimming at night following Julia’s idea in the middle of fishes and sharks (not even kidding, there was a shark attack in Sharm one week after we left); chilling out again at the Spider Coffee, going to Na’ama again to have some booze there – and some back too…

And, of course, meeting Lars, 18, Netherlands, the youngest diving instructor of the whole Sharm. He was living right next door to us, and instantly got into our group, with his two Bedouins friends who did not speak a word of English. But I guess partying together does not need any language.

Unfortunately, Bailey, Kirsten and me had to leave them early; we wanted to see Luxor before leaving Egypt. We knew, sadly, that we were going to miss awesome times with the guys, as we they were before that. We had an incredibly awesome time with all these incredibly awesome friends, both in Shark’s Bay and Na’ama Bay. We would only see them back in Cairo, right before we left Egypt.

The curse of the traveler, I guess, is to befriend people and have to leave them way too early – but is it not the whole point of being human? Knowing extreme sadness because you did know extreme happiness?