My Highs and Lows of Holidaying
in Sharm El Sheikh.
As a first time visitor to Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt it took me days of internet searching and tireless researching to find the right hotel and holiday deal for me. I’m a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to my holidays but when it comes to spending so much money on them, it’s only natural to want the best you can possibly get for your hard earned cash. With a lot of help from Trip Advisor and after hours of reading peoples reviews, I finally picked my hotel.
I chose the Sea Life Sharm Resort in the Naby Bay region of Sharm El Sheikh. It was one of three hotels all in one area. You choose one of the hotels to stay in depending on what kind of atmosphere you want but then have full free access to all of the other hotels too.
I don’t want to bore you with all my holiday details so i’ll just list my highs and lows for you.
The Highs: Sharm El Sheikh is beautiful by day and by night.
The views were stunning, from my balcony I could see both the sea and the pool. The beach was private and very clean. There was always more than enough comfy sunbeds with sun shades and wind breakers available for all. The staff worked really hard to keep their beach looking it’s best, they were forever smoothing out the sand and clearing litter.
The sunsets in Sharm El Sheikh are amazing! They truly are stunning!
One of my favourite things to do at the end of every day, was to sit on the beach and watch the sun go down. The skies were so clear and pretty, the colours were just gorgeous.
If you like swimming with the fishes and checking out local wildlife then you will love it here. The Red Sea is full of beautiful fish and creatures, they’re literally everywhere around you. There was also lots of Lizards around, I was a little nervous of them at the beginning of the week but by the end, I was more than happy to be around them, them were kind of cute.
If you’re not one for relaxing, there’s a great Water Park just a few minutes down the road which you can get to on their free bus. It cost around £16 per person for the day but that wasn’t too bad seeing as it included lunch and free drinks whilst you were there. There was lots of fun slides for both adults and kids and a fun wave pool too. It was a lot more lively here, with loud music being played by the pools and lots of activities for people to join in with. There was dancing lessons, Yoga classes and even Lilo races which looked great.
The Water Parks are definatley worth a visit if you’re looking for a fun (yet cool) day out.
The weather ranged from 35 to 40 degrees in the day and stayed over 30 at night. September is still part of their summer so do expect some really warm weather there.
Our room was a good size and cleaned every day. The bed was very comfortable and the room was fully air conditioned. The balcony was lovely and the TV had lots of channels including some movie ones for us to watch on the evenings. The resort as a whole was very nice, very clean and a generally lovely place to spend a week in the sun.
The Lows: Sharm El Sheikh’s food isn’t the best.
The food for a 4* All Inclusive hotel wasn’t the best. It was all fresh and edible but not very enjoyable in my opinion. There was lots of different themed nights but the food served was pretty much the same every night. There was always chips and potatoes and a pasta bar where you could make up your own pasta dishes but most of the food was over cooked. I guess I’d rather having over cooked food than having it under cooked for health reasons.
The drinks were VERY strong. I’m not quite sure they even have spirit measures as they just tipped everything into a glass. For me, I just couldn’t drink like that, it made me feel sick but for others, they were more than happy. The wine was bitter and very dry, again it was too strong to drink on it’s own. I had to ask for my wine mixed with lemonade to make it drinkable. The cocktails were very limited and again the ones they did allow you to have were just too strong to enjoy. For most of the week, I stuck to drinking water and cola which were the best of the worst. For an all inclusive, the choices were pretty limited too.
The entertainment was okay but not great. There wasn’t a show every night and on the nights when there was, it didn’t start until 9:30pm and then only lasted for an hour or so. You could see the entertainment team worked very hard but I just didn’t enjoy all the waiting around in between shows and the fact that they were on so late at night.
For me, it’s the ‘little’ things that make a good holiday, a great holiday and for me they just didn’t have that. Ice creams were not available in the all inclusive package which was a bit disappointing and there was no snacks like crisps or nuts available either. There seemed to be lots of little things that you had to pay for that should have really been included.
Overall: I had a very enjoyable holiday in Sharm El Sheikh. The highs definatley out weighed the lows. Sharm El Sheikh itself was a beautiful place and the people there were friendly and helpful. Would I go back? To Sharm El Sheikh – Yes. To the Sea Life Sharm Resort – Maybe not. I think I’d like to try a different hotel to see what the differences are.
If you’ve been to Sharm El Sheikh, where did you stay? I’d love to hear from you.
