Winter in the Desert

This is me and Matt my dmt and Gareth, two of the Army boys, diving in front of our dive center. You can see the mountains of Saudi Arabia in the background. The bit of land to the left is the continuation of the seafront that runs in front of our shop. Im on the right hand side.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!
xoxoxo

Since New Years, life has been a bit slower. Most of the tourist left here by the middle of January and wont be returning until March. At work we have contacts with the re-settlement offices for the British Army and have gotten quite a few of them out here since the beginning of the year. I have had quite a few as students but its mostly nice to have a bunch of people around.
Oh I forgot, we had rain!!! It lightly rained for about one night and we paid the consequences for weeks. Almost everyone (except ours) had leaks in their houses, the roads were closed due to flooding and around Egypt houses were collapsing and people were even dying! Right next to our dive center there is a bridge along the boardwalk and that is one of the lowest places here so after about 3 hours after the rain stopped, the water came pouring down from the mountains like a river. It brings everything with it and basically runs into the sea in front of our dive center. The sea was brown for 2 weeks with about 4 ft visibility. The airport was even closed due to a collapsed roof!
Other than the rain we have had a very mild winter which scares me to think of how hot it will be this summer! Since it has been slow most everyone is meeting at the pub frequently to chat or watch sports and we have had quite a few birthdays or going away parties lately, not to mention all the snorkel tests being administered to the Army boys...
As for today, I am meeting a friend for lunch on the seafront and then will go out to dinner with Cameron for Valentine's Day. I've got a pretty good life just now...

We've been living in Egypt now for almost 2 months. Two days after arriving I started work and have been working non-stop since then, which is great. Dahab remains unspoiled and pretty much the same since we were here 2 years ago. It so crazy being back at the same job, Poseidon Divers, and we have actually moved into the same flat we lived in the last time we were here (Cam is working at the same center he worked at before also)! There are alot of the same people which makes it feel as if we never left! The diving is better than I remember and am loving every dive. I have gotten to teach alot of different courses including about 10 or so specialty courses so I will definately not get bored here!
Shortly after arriving we took a trip to Nuweiba which is a Bedouin Village about an hour north of here with my co-workers. The dive center organized the whole thing and we left at 7pm and came back at 7 am the next morning! We stayed at a Bedouin camp and when we arrived it was already dark but we were right on sea and the sky was incredible! I can't remember seeing so many stars before! We had food and a few drinks around a fire and then went to sleep for a short time and before I knew it we were back in the mini bus heading to the center for a full days work!!!
Cameron has taken up windsurfing and is loving it. Wind and Kite surfing here is pretty popular as we apparently have over 300 days with F4-5 Winds...
I had a camel safari at work which means I take people diving but to a place where no cars can go so we have to take camels. We took to to Ras Abu Galum an area about an hours walk from the furthest north road in Dahab. The camels carry all our equipment with us sitting on them as well! My camel was the leader and as soon as he stood up he started walking way ahead of everyone else, he knew where he was going! It was actually kind of relaxing but I was sooooo sore the next day and think I will walk next time I have to do one.
We recently helped celebrate the holiday called Eid al-Adha, Festival of Sacrifice. It comes from when Abraham was going to sacrifice his son for God but then was allowed by God to sacrifice a ram instead. Its about spending time with friends and family and thanksgiving for having food. Each family sacrifices an animal and gives 1/3 to his family, 1/3 to his friends and neighbors and 1/3 to the poor. Cameron's boss slaughtered a sheep(or maybe it was a goat) and we had a nice BBQ on the beach. During this time there were cows and other animals tied up around town. I even saw someone walking a cow along the boardwalk and I was just hopeing that I could get past before they killed it. We had nice food and I tried the meat and it was ok.
So Christmas came and went and we had some elaborate plans for lots of eating and drinking and Xmas dinner with about 20 people at a friends house. At about noon on Christmas Day I started getting a bad stomach and continued to be sick for 4 days... I also woke up on the 26th with bronchitits, so its been fun. I not only missed Xmas but have missed four days of work as well. I will be going back tomorrow, lets just hope I can equalize my ears!
Hope everyone has a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!! x

Photos!

Cooking the sheep meat. Cam's boss Khalid is in the green.

Feast BBQ

Me on a Camel

Camels getting loaded up, see our tanks in those burlap sacs?

We also rode these ones, they can hold alot of weight!

The Camp in the morning, we slept under that thatched roof to the left

Cam trying to get some sleep in Nuweiba

Camp in Nuweiba at 6am

Cam, on his 3rd day

Pony that escaped from it's mom to have a snack

View from Lagoon

EGYPT!

So, I am back in Egypt! I'm having a FANTASTIC time and working hard! We dont have internet at home at the moment and so I will update properly very soon. Happy Holidays to everyone! xxx

New Adventures...

I know it has been so long since I have written a proper post but time has been flying by! Cameron and I left Malta at the beginning of October and have since visited West Virginia (where my dad lives), Maryland and are now in Scotland. After arriving here we traveled up north to a town called Aviemore in the Scottish Highlands. We are leaving here tomorrow on a train to go to Manchester for the weekend and then will be flying from Manchester to Sharm and then bussing it back to Dahab!!! I am so excited and can not wait to be back in the Red Sea, literally!
After spending 3 days in WV we headed to Solomons just in time for the wedding preparations! Christophers wedding was on the 10th of October and we had an awesome time. After the wedding we proceeded to move the party down to the Tiki Bar and had an awesome night with family and friends. So awesome that we had to stay in bed all day on Sun! I got to see alot of my friends and do some relaxing as well. We arrived in Edinburgh last week and spent 4 days up north with Cameron's parents, both his brothers as well has one of their girlfriends and her 3 boys. We arrived back to Edinburgh and have been preparing for our next home! I have spent most the day packing and trying to stay under the weight limit and we are ready to go, but first we are stopping in Manchester to visit Kat and Anna, our friends from Honduras and I can't wait to see those girls. Finally on Sunday we are flying back to Egypt! I really will try to keep up with my blog while I'm there and I'm sure being back there will provide plenty of interesting stories... Happy Halloween! xxx

West Virginia, Maryland, Scotland & beyond...

Cam's family

Our house in Aviemore

Along one of our walks through a sculpture garden

One of the Lochs

Out with the girls

The DT girls!

4-wheelin in WV

We climbed up Seneca Rocks in WV

on the farm

Always fun to shoot cans...

Cam, mom and Kristy at the wedding

Mr & Mrs Cochran!

Cameron's first wedding!

Thx Cat for the pic... will update blog soon! x

21 days left

I know I've been so lame at posting and keeping in touch lately but I have just survived an insane few months at work. The shop that I work at was suppose to have 2 Instructors all summer but Ian, the other guy here with me, had some medical problems and left after only working through June. I don't think I have ever worked so hard and am so glad it is coming to an end. We are still steady now but I am getting help from some other instructors. 9pm doesn't seem like such an early bedtime anymore!

We also had some visitors as well! Cameron's cousin and girlfriend came out and stayed for a week. They rented their own flat but we spent every night with them, it was a great time. Lots of eating and drinking... Cameron even took them diving for the first time and they loved it!

As you may have guessed I've got 21 days of work left! I CAN NOT wait!!! Cam and I are flying to Edinburgh for a day to drop off some things and then off to Washington DC! We will be back in MD for 3 weeks and are already making plans to visit my dad in WV, Relax with family, for sure seeing all the new babies and most importantly celebrating Christopher's wedding! I can't wait to be able to sleep and have more than one day off in a row!

Other than getting ready to leave Malta not much is going on... Yesterday I had this "VIP" journalist from Belgium that I was taking for a try-dive and was suppose to take extra special care of her... So about a minute after she got here I could tell it wasn't going to happen, she was extremely nervous, and had never been snorkeling before. We got in the water and I was trying to help her get her fins on and she wanted to know if she really had to wear them... (for anyone that doesn't know your fins are what you use to move in the water and without them you have no control) After about 40 minutes in shallow water we decided it wasn't going to happen for her at that time so I said I would take her snorkeling... Every time I looked back at her she had her head up and was trying to get water out of her snorkel and I'm not sure if she even got to breath properly from it... Anyways, after we get out she says she has something to tell me and proceeds to inform me that this was the first time she had EVER been in the sea in her life!!!!!!!!!!!! Crazy.

So, Cam and I arrive on the 1st of Oct and leave to go back to Scotland on the 21st. We stay there until Oct 30 th when we head to Manchester, England to stay with Kat and Leigh for the weekend and Anna and her boyfriend(an American who we've never met) will be there too! We leave from Manchester on Nov 1st to fly back to Dahab...

Ahhh, to be on the move again. Now I feel like I can breathe.

I'm coming hooooooooooooooommmmmeeeee..... 34 days!

More Birthdays

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRISTOPHER!!! I can't believe how old we are! I hope you have a great day.

Let's see... what is there to say about Malta in July. It's hot, real hot. The high last week was 100F and there is still a good chance to get sunburned until 7pm. The UV Index is 10 and if it is 10 and higher it is recommended you stay inside... all day. Obviously that is impossible but needless to say I am trying as much as I can to stay out of the sun. The recession has definitely hit here... the hotels and beaches aren't as full and I actually haven't been diving in the past few days. It's nothing too much to worry about but everyone is feeling a bit slow at the moment.

We have started going to quiz night at the pub on our street and last Friday night, we invited a bunch of people. It's an English Pub so most of the questions are British. English football (soccer), Royalty and geography. The first time we went I only knew the answer to one question, which was what feature is missing on the Mona Lisa... All the others were British. Anyways, so we invited a bunch of English people to increase our odds of winning the grand prize (a bottle of wine and a lottery ticket for a €400,000 jackpot) but somehow all the English people sat together and we were left with a team of one Englishman, one Scotsman, one Maltese, one Danish and me! Our team name was The Internationals. Needless to say we didn't win, we got 14 out of 25. But there was one American question!!! What do American's call the boot of their car? Anyone??? It's the trunk. We'll have to try again this week...

Speaking of British people, I still get surprised alot by how different we can be. I had an English student and we went to the cafe in between dives and he asked to buy me a drink and when I asked for Gatorade he looked at me and said what's that? That's crazy to me. Also, Cam and I were at the movies the other day and there was a poster for the G.I. Joe movie that is coming out and my boyfriend has never heard of G.I. Joe... is Britain on another planet or what?!

Surprise Surprise I had a toothache 2 weeks ago and went to the dentist, his name is Justin. He filled a cavity and said it would be €40. I didn't have enough cash and he didn't take credit cards so I said I would go to the bank and bring the money back and he said not to worry about it I could just bring it back to him when I came back (I made an appt for 2 weeks later)! All he knows about me is my name and mobile number, Oh yeah and when you go to the doctor here you don't fill out any paperwork or sign any forms. Justin was just about to put the needle in my mouth and then was like, oh yeah, do you have any medical problems?... Its so relaxed, that's how all the doctors I've seen are like.

I seriously can't believe that it's the middle of summer already... Time goes by too fast, slow it down people... and my friends just keep having babies, all the time! I can't wait to come home in October for C's wedding and am excited for Cam to see MD in the Fall. Hopefully the weather will be good. Happy Late 4th of July, I was devastated to find out that there was a picnic with crabs going on without me... I hope everyone is enjoying their summer! xxx

Birthdays

Our birthdays came and went and now I'm 31. We had a great Sat night out with friends and ended up dancing at a Salsa Club at 3am, I guess I'm not that old. We also got to go diving together the weekend before to the wreck of the HMS Hellespont, an old paddle steamer that was built in 1910 and sunk in WWII. I felt so out of my element being back on a boat, since I have been shore diving for the past 3 seasons. It was a great dive but as we were doing our stops on the way up we had to hang onto the line at 6 meters in blue water for a while and since it was rough I actually got sea sick... underwater, it sucked. Once we finally got on the boat we had to wait for everyone else and I couldn't look away from the horizon. I told Cam not to tell any of them I was a Dive Instructor! I think I have stayed in place too long and have lost my ability to deal with motion sickness. I used to get it quite bad, not as bad as my mom who can't even go to see an action movie at the theatre, but once I started traveling I quickly had to get over it with all the ferry and back road bus trips. I'm sad to say it's def gone but if I had my way I would start work on getting it back asap.

Cameron is teaching his first Technical Diving Course this week and is super excited about it. He has been having so much fun fiddling with the equipment for the past few days and grilling me with the exam questions. Work for me is fine, the sea has been so flat for weeks and the water is really warming up! Yeah! Malta just made a new law, anyone with a Maltese boat license has to be certified in first aid/CPR so I have been teaching about 5 of them a week to the locals and has proved to be challenging and as well as fun.

Cam and I were sitting on our balcony last night and saw a car with it's window rolled down and we commented on the fact that the car wasn't locked up and then we saw why. One of the stray cats on our street, which by the way gets fed more than 10 cats worth of food, was laying in the back seat licking itself. We watched it clean itself, then knead the upholstery in the back and then finally move to the drivers seat to sleep for the night. Guess we know why the window was down now.

Hope everyone has a good weekend and HAPPY FATHER'S DAY Dad!!! xxx

Photos

In Portomaso Marina, all the posh resturants and six figure flats surround this bay

View from Upper Barraka Gardens, Valletta

Jean and I in Mdina

View from the Cafe in Mdina

Another Visitor

We had our second visitor 2 weekends ago... Cameron's mum.  Ryanair, one of the European budget airlines just added a new direct route from Malta to Edinburgh so Jean decided to come for a visit.  She was here for three nights and stayed in our flat with us.  Cameron and I both had Sunday off and we went to Valletta and walked around, watched the noon day salute where they fire off a cannon, then we went to Mdina and had chocolate cake at a cafe overlooking the island. We had nice meals out and Jean and Cam even came to my work on Monday and took a sneaky dip in the hotel pool.  It was really nice to have Jean out here and fun for family to see where we are living.  I hope my mom comes soon:)  

Our new Instructors for the season have arrived.  Both are from England and I have helped show them around, both driving and diving.  It is consistently warm now and in the high 80's low 90's.  I am already going brown although I've got a farmers tan complete with flip flop lines on my feet. Tomorrow is my last day off with Cam for the summer. We were trying to get on a boat trip to dive a cool wreck, but it is full so I'm not sure what we will do now.  We will probably celebrate our birthdays tonight as well... We've got a little over a week, Cam's is the 7th and mine is the 9th... Agh, I can't believe I'm turning 31.  That's worse than turning 30.  At least my boyfriend is only turning 27... LOL

All the new Instructors and seasonal workers are arriving and we are meeting lots of new people. We spent the evening with friends at a beach bar called Exiles on Thursday night.  It was one of Cameron's friends 30th birthday and we had a great time.  We met the new pilots of the sea planes they have here, one is Italian and one is Greek and they are so much fun. Maybe we can trade some diving for a ride!  It's great to see things start to liven back up after the winter.  I think both Cam and I are glad to be able to have someone else to talk to!  

Cameron is busy taking some online business classes and I just finished a 10 week writing course online.  The sea temperature is steadily increasing, thank God, and I've had some really experienced divers recently which makes work much more fun... I'm looking forward to the summer and to see what comes next!

After I had settled into being back in Malta, I stupidly volunteered to work on a Sunday (we are closed Sundays in the winter) I contracted some type of Rotovirus... no really I think it was  some gastro thing or other... either way, I didn't return to work until the next Monday.  I am blaming getting sick on the diver I had on Sunday, something was going around his hotel, and I will never volunteer to work on my day off again!  I guess it was good as I lost the 5lbs I had put on while I was home.  After 4 days of visiting the bathroom every 2 hours I finally went to the doctor almost in tears asking when I was going to get better... he said it could last up to a week. It started on a Monday and by Saturday morning I was finally starting to feel better.  That was brutal but thankfully Cameron didn't get it which was good since I needed him to take care of me.  After a few days back at work I started diving again and managed to regain my strength and am now 100%. 

 

At the end of the week I returned to work our friends from the UK arrived.  Kathryn and I met in Honduras while Cameron was her dive instructor.  We also met up with her and her boyfriend Leigh for New Years this past year.  They arrived late on Thursday night.  We went for one dive on Friday and then out for some drinks.  On Saturday we went to Gozo for the day doing 2 dives where Leigh managed to get a serious sunburn on the back of his neck.  We spent the night out again eating dinner at a Maltese restaurant drinking the Maltese Special Reserve wine(costs about 3euros a bottle) and we had a great night.  We stayed in bed late on Sunday and then headed to Mdina (the old capital, it's Valletta now) and walked around a bit and then napped in the afternoon.  Sunday night we headed to Paceville (pronounced parch-a-ville) which is the trendy area in Malta, needless to say we don't frequent the bars there but we checked some fun ones out and had a great night.  The night ended with us smoking sheesha at a salsa bar called Fuegos.   

We were both sad when they left, we had such a great time while they were here but we are already trying to make plans to meet up with them and Anna for New Years again this year.  

With Kathryn and Leigh gone we have been trying to catch up on our sleep and taking a break from the wine...  Work is really starting to pick up and the weather has really been nice lately. This week we are looking at a high of 70F this week!  I have divers everyday starting tomorrow through next week so I'm hoping for a bit of a tan soon!!!  I love the sun!

Happy Spring everyone! 

 

First pictures then words...

Cam and I outside the gates of Mdina, Malta's original capital
View of Blue Hole (we go diving in there) in Gozo.
We are standing on top of the Azure window.

All of us in Egypt... just kidding:) Yummy sheesha

Me swimming out of a cave in Gozo

Cam and I

Cam Kat and I looking out over Malta from Mdina

Walking through Mdina

Checking out someone's birds...

Cam and I on a night out in Paceville

Kat Leigh and I after a dive in Gozo, with the Azure window

in the background and really bad hair!

I have so much to catch up on but wanted to post these pictures first then will work on writing... Cam and I had friends out from the UK and had a blast... Here are some photos...

Surprise!

I am back in Malta now… oh yeah, you didn’t know I had left. I had been keeping a small secret, mostly to those close with my mom. My mom spent Feb 14th – March 14th in Gulf Shores Florida (or Alabama, I’m not sure) When she arrived back home late on the 14th of March, she had no idea I was sleeping in the house next door. The next morning I had Christopher go over to see if she was up yet, he took he to the front of the house and as I came in the back door quietly she stood up to see who was there. I walked through the kitchen and we met face to face in the dining room. It was a great surprise. My mom stood there looking so confused and just screamed. She wouldn’t even touch me she was so freaked out. It was great. She said her first thought was that maybe I was moving home. Sorry mom, but I did come home for a visit.

I was home for 2 weeks and of course it flew by so fast. I got to see so many people and hang out with friends it was great. I also met a few new members to my inner circle, Saylor Jane and Zora. Friends organized a night out in Leonardtown and although it gets blurry there toward the end, it was a great night! I did some shopping and tons of eating. Once my bags were packed, I mean cram packed, it felt like I had just arrived, as it always does and I was on my way back to the airport. I left at 10pm and landed in London at 9am. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention I had a tooth pulled the day before I left, don’t ask, which made for an interesting trip. I decided to load up on the pain pills once we took off and I had 3 seats in a row so I could lie down. After staying in the same place for so long now I’m beginning to lose my travelers touch and somehow succumbed to some kind of illness. Once we landed in Heathrow, I didn’t know if I could make it off the plane without being sick and grabbed a air sickness bag on the way out just in case. I walk down the stairs of the plane to see a bus we have to take to get back to the airport. It is completely full. The ride was only about 10 minutes but felt like forever, all I could think about while I sweated through my t-shirt was how I was going to throw up on everyone around me. Thankfully I made it and almost collapsed once I got into the fresh air. I started feeling better once I wasn’t moving and tried to find a place to hang out during my layover. I had to wait there all day until my flight to Malta left at 8pm. I rented a room at the yotel, a hotel thingy inside the terminal where you can rent rooms by the hour. Not really rooms, they are more like an Asian inspired train car. I slept for 4 hours and then caught my ride back to Malta.

I arrived at 1am and Cameron was there waiting for me. It felt really good to be back as well as in warmer weather. Since I’ve been back it has been sunny and warm everyday and now I’m just waiting for the water temperature to start to rise back up. We have really been enjoying our new flat and Cam and I are going to have a roommate for a few weeks. Someone that has come for diving courses needs a place to stay while he looks for a more permanent place and it is great extra money for us. He will stay until our friends from the UK come out at the end of the month.

Here are a few pictures taken while I was home.

26 YEARS OF FRIENDSHIP

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BETSY

xoxoxo

Visitors

We have our first visitors in Malta! Our friends Kat and Leigh are coming in April! They will be coming for 5 nights and we will do a few days diving. Cameron is going to teach Leigh his Advanced Course as well. This will be the 5th country that Kat and I have got together in... We met in Honduras, then met for New Years in Amsterdam, she came out to Egypt 2 summers ago, we spent New Years together this year in Scotland and now we will be together in Malta. I think that anytime Kat and/or Anna and I meet up it should be in a new country and all of us are hoping to meet up next winter in France for a ski holiday:)

As for Malta, we had a spell of amazing weather where Cam managed to actually get a sunburn and now we are back to gail force winds. I am hoping that within the next few weeks the weather will steadily get warmer and warmer, I need the sun so badly (and a tan!).

Cameron has just done a RYA boating course and the Instructor does these speed boat races here with those boats that I call cigarette boats. That is the boat Cam learned in and now he will be able to drive our boat at the dive center. I can't remember if I said but Cam got a job at H2O this year, he will manage the shop I worked at last summer and I am going to be working at another one at the Radisson Hotel (still H2O). It will be fun to work closer together but that means we won't have any days off together all summer :(

Oh yeah, one of the best things happened the other day... Cameron is diving for a week with a group of fellow Scottish and Irish lads. After introducing himself and chatting of a bit, one of them said "Where are you from? America?"

Ahhh Haaa

That's awesome.

Happy Spring everyone!!!

Pictures

Cam and I taking a walking in the hills with a nice view of some small town

In the very distance you can see 3 buildings, that is the Radisson and the dive center I work at is on that beach

There are even farms up here

Ta Dah! Our new flat... just after a clean.

The tv is just for looks, we don't have cable.