Julie's Boggle

Well it looks like there’s going to be a bit of an enforced break where the Red Sea posts are concerned (I might post-date the last one or two when I get back just for completeness ).

The reason for the break? Tomorrow Tom and I are heading off down south-west for a week’s holiday (yes, I know we’ve just had one). This time we’re going to the scenic counties of Devon and Cornwall.

Our club was so pleased with last year’s dive trip to the southern tip of Cornwall – Lizard Point – that they organised another one this year, and made it a day longer. We’ll be diving from next Thursday to Sunday, and with all the travel, and a bank holiday weekend this coming weekend, it just made sense to make a week of it. As we’d already seen a fair bit of Cornwall as part of our trip down last year, we decided to throw in more of Devon this time around.

The general itinerary is as follows: We’re heading down as far as Exeter this Saturday to stay with some ex-London friends there; and then we’re moving on to a B&B, also in Devon for three nights. Mid-week we’ll drive on down to Cornwall, do our diving, then back to Exeter on the Sunday evening, back to London on the Monday. Whew!

Now all we need to do is pack, and hope for the weather to buck up after a week’s worth of sombre grey clouds and drizzle every couple of hours!

Wednesday:
The day started with a rather rude awakening when the boat engines rumbled to life, more than an hour before the bell. We were moving round to the other side of the two Gubal islands for our first dive of the day and even from our beds it felt like a wildly rocking trip.

Today’s first dive was the Rosalie Moller, a Scottish cargo ship working for the Royal Navy, sunk by German bombers in 1941. At 44m to the sea bed, the deepest parts of her were well below our certification range so we were going to have to be careful about how deep we let ourselves go.

Going down this was also the worst visibility of any of our Red Sea dives. We just had to follow the rough blue nylon rope down to the mast, but the wreck was hardly visible at all almost 20m.

Overall, it was interesting as being the deepest dive we’d ever been on by ourselves (to 33m) but that kept us entirely above deck so we didn’t see that much. With the darkness and the slightly cloudy water, this was far more like a UK dive than any we encountered that week.

Over breakfast, other divers who had explored inside were praising the quality of the wreck, and I think it’s safe to say that we missed out on rather a lot of that. The highlight for me was the swarms of tiny darting silver fish around the mast. Swirling a torch beam at them produced a really nifty optical effect.

After we’d eaten, we had another rolling trip back to Small Gubal. The weather wasn’t too pleasant out, so we relaxed in lounge area with lots of swaying and creaking, and occasional crashing, around us.

The next dive, as indicated by Malin’s excellent drawing (markerpen on whiteboard), was along a rather spectacular wall known as Bluff Point. And this time I was takiing a turn at being the leader of our buddy pair — something that has been known to put one in a tricky position in an environment where communication is extremely limited.

This was the first dive where the current was really noticeable as we dropped away from the Zodiacs and headed for the protection of the wall. Not far along we found the dark openings in the wall which could only be the caverns Steve had mentioned in the briefing. We swam into one of them and the view up to the top – several meters above us – where rays of sunlight pierced the dimness, reflecting off clouds of silvery glassfish, was awesome.

Other highlights included the biggest gorgonian sea-fan we’d seen so far – this thing was the size of a small tree, complete with realistic looking trunk, only entirely flat and a delicate pink all over.

We had the option of carrying on with the current around the wall to a bay where there would be Zodiacs waiting to pick us up – or we could swim back to the boat. I’d been inspired by another group that swam back all by themselves the day before, so around the halfway mark, by which time we were a fair bit shallower, I indicated that we were heading back the way we’d come.

This turned out to be a memorable swim against a very strong current. It was jolly hard work and I’m still not completely sure why I didn’t just turn us back around and let the current take us to the waiting transport. Tom was apparently thinking we weren’t going to make it all the way back, but we kept on and finally got round the last corner to where the boat was moored.

At that point, we paused to take in the sights, and I reflected that this was actually much nicer than all the heavy finning.

Just then, we had the pleasure of seeing a large Napoleon wrasse drifting through the water not far away from us. This chap was wonderfully comical. He was exactly as you would imagine an amusing animated fish should look. A solid 0.5m long body, which makes his fins look puny, great big thick lips, and these eyes that show their whites as they move. So we could see one of them rolling around as he cast a curious eye over us. What a fantastic character.

The last stretch of getting to the boat turned out to be the hardest swim of all – really blasted our air consumption stats! But at least after that there was lunch to look forward to… and an opportunity for an warm afternoon’s nap out on deck. Mmm.

As a somewhat unusual diversion for a liveaboard holiday, we had a brief excursion onto Small Gubal island mid-afternoon on Tuesday. There had been a fair amount of interest when it was proposed before lunch, but when the time came around, most of the sleepy bodies soaking up the sun on the comfy sunbeds thought better of it.

So it was a party of 7 that made the Zodiac trip over to the island, all kitted up with diving boots as foot protection. This was a genuine desert island, in that there was practically nothing growing on it at all, just sand in all directions. And litter! That was a bit of a mystery – we pondered on the possibilities of fishermen or stuff brought in by the tides, but either way there was an awful lot of it, quite grim really, and the diving boots were very necessary protection against the broken glass as well as the hot sand.

After 30 minutes of looking around in the heat (aside from a lighthouse and a large osprey’s nest, there wasn’t much) it was a pleasure to get back into our damp wetsuits and drop in off the back of the boat. The dive was another wreck-cum-reef. It hadn’t been a terribly big wreck to start with – the general consensus was that it had been an Egyptian patrol boat but no one knew for sure. Now everyone calls it The Barge.

The remains of the wreck, lying on a sandy bottom studded with corals, turned out to be a fantastic fish village! It was just swarming with life in every colour, size and shape.

At one point I was hovering over a familiar scene of a goatfish ferreting in the sand, using one hand on the sand for stability, when a tiny green eel darted out from under a rock and butted my finger with his head. I guess I wasn’t wanted that close to his home so I took the hint and floated off.

Aside from all the diverse fish-life, we discovered not one but three giant moray eels. Their long bodies, mostly hidden under overhangs, were about 2m long! They didn’t seem to mind us too much, just stayed under their rocks with mouths slightly open to reveal little white teeth sloping back, gills moving gently as water passed through them.

With several boats moored directly above us, the noises from engines and outboard motors was more noticeable than ever when they started up – cutting through the underwater calm with their jarring clatter of sound. I wonder if the fish mind?

Several hours later, after another tasty supper (chicken curry this time followed by a yummy Egyptian coconut pudding), we jumped back into the water for a night dive on the same spot. It’s funny, but with all the floodlights from the dive boats we actually had better visibility than when we dived in Anglesey last year during the day!

Dropping through the dark water we found ourselves surrounded by an army of lunar fusilliers (pretty blue and white fish about 15cm long). Thousands and thousands of them, all gliding slowly through the darkness in their protective school – it was a little eerie.

Down on the wreck the fish had mostly vanished. The spiky, black urchins had all crept out from under their rocks, and there were a few lionfish hunting, and the ubiquitous goatfish foraging, but aside from that there was a distinct feeling that the fish had all gone to bed! We found two of our three eels, now out of their hiding places, probably annoyed them with our torches, and then decided to make a strategic retreat ourselves.

Tuesday:
Shortly after 07h30, we were in our kit once more and pounding over the waves in a Zodiac, back to the Abu Nuhas reef.

Today’s first dive was the Carnatic – a grand old P&O steam and sail hybrid which went down in 1869. Almost all of her passengers were saved but the £40,000 of Royal Mint gold in her cargo holds went down, and became the focus of one of the very first proper salvage expeditions later that year. About £10k of the gold was not recovered and the dive guides use that to tantalise divers.

I was a little worried about my left ear which had started to hurt the day before towards the end of the night dive, but it after some mild pain going down, it seemed to clear up.

It was a pretty dive. After all its time underwater the 19th century wreck matched Steve’s description of being “as much a reef as a wreck”. Once again we could explore the complete interior of the great iron hull since all the flooring had rotted away.

For me the highlights of the dive were the shoals of fish sheltering in the bow. These guys were tiny, maybe 1.5 – 2 inches long and a quarter as wide, and they came in schools of silver-blue, a very curious silver-transparent mix (these are glassfish it turns out), and orange. There were masses of them and they formed big clouds in the water, darting and regrouping constantly, flashing like slivers of silver when they all caught the light.

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After breakfast we moved slightly further up the strait on the west side of Sinai, and stopped near two islands known imaginatively as Big Gubal and Small Gubal. The briefing for our pre-lunch dive was up on deck as it was a reef dive at a site called Malek, and the illustrations were a simple schematic drawn by Steve.

We had a Zodiac trip to take us round the corner from the boat, and dropped in just after 12h00.

It was an amazing dive for sea life. There were fish everywhere, from lionfish with their pretty and venomous brown and white spines lurking under overhangs, to clouds of anthias and black and white striped humbug dascyllus. We found a giant clam of about 20cm, opened to expose soft folds that quiver in the passing currents, and spotted a tiny grey moray eel poking out his head.

Of special note was the scorpionfish that Tom noticed lying on a ledge. Exactly the same colour as a lichen-covered rock, he watched us with one careful eye as we hung in the water watching him and marvelling at his camouflage.

His outline is perfectly broken up by a lace filligree effect – little pieces of it hanging off all over his body, and it really appears to be bits of random plant-life growing on a rock. Looking at him was just like one of those optical illusions – one minute you see a rock… the next, the lines in the rock metamorphose into a fish. How cool. .

The final highlight of that dive was a turtle. Oh wow. It was just swimming languidly through the blue, graceful as a dancer as it moved its fins up and down. I could have watched it for hours but we only had a minute or two before it swam out of sight.

At 59 minutes that was one of our longest dives to date – and a thoroughly enjoyable and relaxing hour spent in a very different world.

We had about half an hour of peace and quiet after the boat moored up at its new site. As it was going 11h30, the bell roused us again and we headed indoors for the briefing for the next dive: a wreck. Down in the lounge area Steve had a laptop with wreck details and photos, wired up to a large plasma display for us.

Our first Red Sea wreck was to be the steamship Dunraven which was an early model of iron-hulled cargo ship, operating the “spice run” from England to India. Built in 1873, it went down in 1876.

The visibility below the water was great and we spotted the wreck almost as soon as we jumped in. She was lying upside down and as suggested by Steve, we were able to swim right inside from a hole in her stern.

The UK wrecks we dive are usually too broken up to venture inside so this was a first for us. The massive cavernous interior was very impressive; all the wooden partitioning had since rotted away – leaving just iron supporting girders lying around. Naturally there were quite a few other divers in the wreck with us; looking up we could see the shiny mirrored surface of pools of exhaled air trapped under the structure.

We had quite a long wide swim-through, then single-file past the ship’s massive boilers and out the other side. Swimming back over the hull the pockets of air we’d seen inside were slowly discharging themselves as tiny streams of bubbles wherever they could escape.

The boat’s underside (now the top of the wreck) was completely encrusted with hard corals – these looked as pretty and fragile as icing decorations on a wedding cake.

Once again we saw lots of fish. It was all I could do to remember the colours and patterns of all the unfamiliar ones so I could look them up later.

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We were lounging around on deck again after lunch when the call went out that dolphins had been spotted nearby. And anyone who was interested (everyone I think), could grab a mask, snorkel and fins and go out to swim with them. Our transport for this venture were the Cyclone’s two “Zodiacs” – small boats with an outboard motor.

Once we got over to where the pod had been spotted, it was just a case of plugging in the snorkel, jumping in and looking down.

There in the blue below us were 4 or 5 dolphins. It was amazing to watch them – I’d seen pairs of dolphins together, but never so many. This group spent a long time swimming as a huddle, which must be tricky without hands to keep all the bodies together. They swam in this synchronised form for quite a way, as if they were doing a full body nuzzle or just playing. When the pod drifted away, our snorkelling group followed like enthusiastic groupies, finning to the new spot with eyes glued to the bottom.

Eventually the dolphins decided to move on properly and left us all well behind. We clambered back into the Zodiacs and headed back to the boat for our next briefing.

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Our next dive was also a wreck – the Giannis D, a Greek cargo ship. The Abu Nuhas reef that had sunk her is on the southern edge of the Suez Canal and has claimed many ships over the years. Most notably, this would be one of the newest wrecks we’d ever dived as she only went down in 1983.

They were using the Zodiacs to ferry the groups of divers over to the wreck and once we were there we got to to practice our fully-kitted-up backwards roll – just like in the movies – over the sides of the Zodiac, which is quite fun.

The water was crystal clear as we descended and what struck me was how it was possible to see so much of the wreck’s structure at once. This really helps with appreciating the size and structure of the vessel, and is so often an aspect that is missing when visibility isn’t as good.

The Giannis D lies at a 45°+ angle on the sea bed giving everything a crazy slant that can do funny things to your head if you aren’t vigilant. After idling away some time on the sloping deck waiting for the entrance to be clear of divers, Tom and I made our way inside. The passage was narrow but easily swimmable, and we had lots of opportunity to peer into the various empty rooms as we passed. I did find the angle of everything to be very disorienting just as Steve had mentioned in the briefing. My brain kept trying to line up walls and doors with the vertical when in fact they were anything but!

Everything was so well preserved which I suppose is unsurprising given that it’s a 1980′s wreck. We moved on into an engine room area and were able to easily identify various tools lying around.

The wreck lies in two parts and the area in between (the bit that hit the reef) is just a massive litter of wood, pieces of carpet and other debris.

The fish life wasn’t prolific but it was widely varied. And we did see a massive specimen – about 40cm long – of one of my favourite fishes: the parrotfish. (So called because of their cute beaks which they use to nibble at the coral, and which I love because they always appear to be smiling. )

Looking back, this was my personal favourite of all our wreck dives. It was a number of factors, but the water clarity and the brain-twisting experience of the angled rooms certainly made it stand out.

Back at the surface, we had the novel experience of getting back into the Zodiac after a dive – which we’d heard the theory of but never practised. The first trick is to get off one’s weight belt and pass that to the waiting hands without either dropping the belt or getting clubbed on the head. Then comes the jacket (and its attached cylinder), which although heavy fortunately floats quite nicely all by itself seeing as it’s full of air. Then lastly, you have to get yourself in. There’s a bit of a trick to this and sometimes I managed it better than others.

Worst case scenario, you jump up and cling to the ropes on the side, flailing valiantly at the water with your fins; and then the folk in the boat haul you over bodily, leaving you like a beached whale on the bottom of the boat with all the kit. At best, a winning combination of finning and the swell, and the boat’s edge resting low in the water, gets you right onto the edge without any help, and you just swing your legs over like a pro. I think I managed pretty well on that first occasion although sadly there wasn’t much of an audience to appreciate it!

From there it was back to the boat again to appreciate the sunset on deck before the last dive of the day and our first night dive…

Monday:
It was off to an early start for our first day of diving in the Red Sea. The boat engines started shortly after 05h00 to move us to our first destination for the day – just round the corner from the marina – and the wake-up bell came jangling up and down the corridor outside our room at 06h00.

My morning routine immediately fell into a pattern to be followed for the rest of the week: throw some clothes on, pop a Stugeron to ward off sea-sickness, stick in my contact lenses, and then head upstairs to the lounge area to get coffee and a piece of the sweet vanilla loaf cake that was always waiting for us. Half an hour after the bell, Steve would start the briefing for the first dive of the day.

Once I had my coffee, I nipped outside with my camera to get some photos.

The first morning’s briefing was the longest at an hour, and it covered a lot of general stuff. It included the rules about no dive knives allowed in the marine park, and no gloves allowed full-stop. The dive company insist on this rule to stop people touching things or feeling the inclination to take home souvenirs. Along with this rule came the warning to avoid touching the fire coral as it tends to cause a nasty rash, and a short list of venomous fish that might lead to amputations of incautious digits!

For all of us, the first dive of the week is what they call a “check-dive”. Where you check out that all your kit still works after the trip, and that your weight belt is adjusted for the Red Sea’s saltiness; and at the same time the dive guides check you out to verify that you aren’t going to go damaging a reef with rough kicking or uncontrolled buoyancy. The site was Ras Katy, a reef that falls to a shallow sandy-bottom – the ultimate beginner’s dive.

Tom and I were both diving in our full one-piece 7mm wetsuits since it was generally acknowledged that the water wasn’t warm enough to be comfortable in much less than that. I’d brought my 5mm short wetsuit as a potential to go over the 7mm, but that was never necessary.

They organise the dives in two waves to try and avoid over-crowding on the dive deck. We were part of the second wave and as we got ready, the Egyptian crew members were right on hand to help with anything and everything. Having willing hands ready and waiting took a lot of the grind out of kitting up, particularly closing Tom’s wetsuit zip which is a real fight for me, but easy for our tall crew member!

Once we were ready, we simply stepped off the end of the deck and into the cool blue world waiting below us. Having done the Barrier Reef we weren’t strangers to tropical waters, but it really is wonderful to be in such a lovely environment. There were loads of fish covering the reef in all the gorgeous tropical colours, spiky black urchins sticking out from under every rock, and the less typical sight of a blue-spotted ray (it’s head was about half a meter across) lying calmly on the bottom.

On the sandy bottom I saw my first goatfish. This guy seemed to have the most character of all the fish because he had a pair of white whiskery barbels just under his mouths – only about 2cm long – which were busily delving around in the pale sand, I guess with the intention of stirring up edible bits. And as was very typical, there were a couple of other random fish just hanging around; watching the agitated sand diligently to see if the goatfish’s activities stirred up anything interesting that they could munch. When disturbed our goatfish simply tucked away his barbels and swam away, suddenly looking like any other fish.

When we got back to the boat after our 38 minutes underwater, our helpers were ready and waiting to unclip our fins, unzip our wetsuits and lift our cylinders back into their supports on the bench. Then it was a rush to dry and change (and I always made a point of rinsing my hair after each dive) before the jangle of the breakfast bell.

Breakfast, which tended to be the same from day to day, was continental with an Egyptian flavour in terms of the cold meats and cheeses available. My choices tended to be fruit salad, followed by several pancakes (crepes) with honey. Omelettes were offered and cooked on demand but I found the rest of the selection tended to be enough for me.

We had a few hours to while away after that in the warmth of the upstairs deck. Time to pull out my PDA and update it with dive details, read a book, laze in the heat of the overcast sun. As we relaxed, the boat moved us on to the other side of the Sinai peninsula where we’d be doing our next few dives.

Sunday:
When the alarm went off at 05h10 it was all systems go. I chucked some coffee into our insulated travel mugs for the trip and we left without breakfast, counting on our meal on the plane for that. So it was just a case of dressing and tipping our gear into the car and then we were off!

The drive to Gatwick was brilliant on the quiet roads – and pretty too with the surrounding countryside looking greener than it has for months. An hour later we found ourselves in the maze of roads and outlying carparks that surround Gatwick’s north terminal, following the signs for our prebooked parking vendor.

There was hardly time to get out the bags and rinse the mugs before one of the parking buses arrived to ferry us to the terminal and from there it was the usual rounds of queueing and waiting until just after 09h00 when we got onto our flight.

It turns out that “Monarch Airlines” are looking for some sort of record in fitting the most passengers into a standard Airbus. It was 100% economy class, and I don’t think I’ve ever come across seats with such limited leg-room. I had about an inch of free space between my knees and the seat in front of me so I feel sorry for the taller people who were on the flight! Fortunately I did end up with a spare seat next to me which helped a bit with spreading out.

09h35 and we were certainly well ready for our breakfast as we got into the air. There were a few nervous moments as we perused the literature in the seat pockets and discovered that there were lots of drinks and bar snacks for sale but no mention of proper food! Some time later, we did get an announcement that there would be a “hot breakfast” – of course this only took place after they had spent ages wheeling the bar trollies up and down selling drinks.

The breakfast wasn’t great even by airline food standards, but we ate it all and took advantage of the complimentary tea/coffee that followed.

Once that was gone we still had a couple of hours to while away and these seemed to drag on and on. But at last we had sight of the deserts of Egypt below us, and the Nile wandering like a great dirty road through the middle of the country with its broad strips of lush growth on each side.

Time to fast-forward two hours to tune into Egypt’s time-zone: which made it 16h45, and we’d finally landed in Sharm el Sheik.

The first impression – like with SA – was the heat. It was 30°C outside. And the dryness. There seemed to be desert all around with the mountains of the Sinai peninsula a hazy, dark overlay on the overcast sky, dominating the view on one side.

The Arrivals terminal felt like a traditional market. The minute we crossed the threshold we were bombarded with noise as the tour operators all call out together trying to attract their passengers. We tracked down our Tony Backhurst agent in the throng, got ourselves ticked off and received our two pre-paid Egyptian visas. Then we joined one of the many queues that stretched their way across the entire arrivals hall, and were still growing as more people arrived behind us.

Looking at the arrival screens as we stood around, we observed that we were one of about 7 planes over a period of 15 minutes. No wonder the place was packed. Finally we got through to get our visas and passports stamped and then it was through to the chaos of the baggage hall.

Tom had already noted from the display in Arrivals that our bags were supposed to be on Carousel 1. Or maybe not… As we approached, fending off porters shouting “Trolley! Trolley!” at the crowd, we saw Carousel 1 jerk to life – moving along a few meters and at the same time bumping a number of suitcases off the end due to the fact that it was so overloaded already. This happened one more time with similar effect, and that was the last time we saw Carousel 1 move at all.

On closer inspection, Carousel 1 was filled with suitcases from Rome, and their owners started trickling through from Arrivals after about 15 minutes of us standing around. Some of them seemed slightly surprised to find the carousel not moving but mostly they just walked around and picked up their cases as if this were an everyday approach to luggage collection.

It was approaching 18h00, by which time we’d been there for an hour already, when various yellings from the tour guides of “Gatwick, Gatwick” indicated that our baggage had shown up on another random carousel. Hurrah.

Once we had got our two suitcases firmly in hand, it was time to join the Tony Backhurst tour operators by the door, and then traipse after them to the waiting coach which took us off the Sharm marina.

At 19h00 when we arrived, the marina was buzzing with activity as trolley-loads of aluminium dive cylinders, luggage and groups of tourists were shunted to and fro. From the coach, all we had to do was identify our cases and follow the trolley with them on to our boat, the Cyclone. Then it was shoes off, and into the boat’s lounge area for introductions.

Doing most of the talking, was Steve, an Aussie from Perth who introduced us to Malin, (“pronounced ‘marlin’ like the fish”) the other part of the dive guide team and his Swedish girlfriend, and our two main helpers on the crew side, Samir and Ibrahim. We were two of 17 guests (the boat takes 20 max.).

After giving us the low-down on what to expect for the next five days and some tips for life on-board, we were allocated our cabins and left some time to set up our dive kit and unpack.

The cabins were all identical, twin beds with en-suite and airconditioned. Very cleverly thought out, they have loads of nooks and crannies for stowing stuff despite being very compact. The bathroom was what they call a “wet-room” here in the UK – basically a big shower with a loo and basin in it. Fortunately it was a proper toilet – not like the marine loos we have on the UK hardboats – but they did want us to put all toilet paper into the bin to avoid any congestion.

Back outside, once we’d hauled all our dive gear out of our big suitcase, they stowed the case (and our shoes) away for us and each diver picked a station on the dive deck to set up their kit. Jackets and regs went onto the cylinders we’d been allocated, wetsuits went on hangers on each side, everything else went into coloured crates (one per diver) under each bench. Then, with a loud ringing of the brass bell hanging nearby, it was time for supper.

The food was yummy, Egyptian lager (billed at $4.50 for a 500ml can) was pallatable, and we made a good start at getting to know our fellow divers.

Afterwards we had some time out on the upper deck, in the warm darkness under the stars to reflect on the start of our holiday; beneath us, life on the marina carried on going like a bustling, floodlit village. Then it was back to the cabin where I fell asleep to the soothing background rumble of the aircon unit beneath my bed.

It’s been quite a long day, but I’m actually not feeling too bad. Which I consider impressive given that I’m sure part of my head still thinks it’s on Egyptian time, which would make it well past time for bed.

We managed to make good use of our 5-hour flight last night in terms of sleeping. The flight left at 22h30 and they served a hot meal, which we declined, just before midnight. Once the trollies had been past, it all got fairly quiet; and with my eye-patch, noise-cancelling headphones, and blow-up cushion, I managed a passable imitation of sleep all the way through to 03h45 when the captain announced 15 minutes to landing.

The time gets confusing there as we rewind 2 hours to get us back to UK time. Even on the second time around, I spent a lot of the time between 03h00 and 04h00 dozing fitfully as Tom navigated us back home from Gatwick through the dark and very quiet streets. Fortunately he was wide awake every time I checked.

Some crazy birds were already getting started on their pre-pre-dawn chorus as we did our unloading. They didn’t keep me awake though. It was just a case of retrieving my ‘jamas from the luggage, brushing teeth, and hitting the sack at 04h15. We set the alarm for 5 hours later as we had friends having their baby baptised at St Simons at the 10h30 service.

It turned out that the alarm was hardly necessary in the end, and we were both feeling quite refreshed by 09h15. And now more than 12 hours later, I think it’s safe to say that it wasn’t as bad as all that – the quiet roads were certainly worth a lot of the lost sleep on both ends!

Getting back to the trip, it was great. Absolutely fantastic. Would do it again in a flash if we had the leave to manage it. But it’s far too much for one post, so I’ll post the daily break-downs over the next few days / weeks, and hopefully getting some of our (above-water) photos up as well. So watch this spot!