Sharm El Sheik, Egypt

The simplicity of sun, sea and sand. The luxury of five-star hotels, water sports, shopping and entertainment. This is Sharm el-Sheikh, one of the most accessible and developed tourist resort communities on the Sinai peninsula. All around are Bedouins, colorful tents, mountains and sea. There are small, intimate hotels with modern designs, as well as larger hotel complexes belonging to International chains, plus about all the amenities one could expect of a tourist center, including casinos, discos and nightclubs, golf courses and health facilities. In fact, with diving and snorkeling, windsurfing and other water sports, horses and camel riding, desert safaris, and great nearby antiquities attractions, it is almost impossible for a visitor to ever suffer from boredom.

Four miles south the southern section of the town stands on a cliff overlooking the port. and is a great view.

Shark's Bay is also nearby, and again is a growing resort community with more and more to offer, along with several diving centers.

The small harbor known as Sharm el-Moiya is located next to the civil harbor, has accommodations for boats, and includes a Yacht Club with rooms.

For those who live to shop, the Sharm El-Sheikh mall provides shops with both foreign and local products, including jewelry, leather goods, clothing, pottery and books.

It has been said that this is a must visit for all diving enthusiasts.  There are many diving sites along the 10 mile beach between Sharm el-Sheikh and Ras Nusrani.

A hunk of sterile buildings on a plateau commanding docks and other installations, SHARM EL-SHEIKH was developed by the Israelis after their capture of it in the 1967 War. Their main purpose was to thwart Egypt's blockade of the Tiran Strait and to control overland communications between the Aqaba and Suez coasts. Tourism was an afterthought – though an important one, helping to finance the Israeli occupation and settlements, which Egypt inherited between 1979 and 1982. Since then, Sharm's infrastructure seems to have expanded in fits and starts, without enhancing its appeal much. Despite some plush hotels and reams of propaganda about it being a slick resort, Sharm el-Sheikh is basically a dormitory town for the Egyptian workers who service neighbouring Na'ama Bay. Aside from package tourists conned by brochures, the only foreigners here are divers – drawn by the proximity of Ras Umm Sidd and other reefs – and a few backpackers who take advantage of its cheapish accommodation and commute into Na'ama Bay. Sharm has a beach, but its small bay doesn't match that of Na'ama, and the seedy downtown area also detracts from the hotels' "luxury" pretensions. In its defence, however, Sharm el-Maya has some good restaurants, snack bars and souvenir shops, and is the cheapest place in the area to go shopping for food.