Nabq Protactorate, Sharm el Sheikh, South Sinai

My daughter enjoying the sea

Some days ago, I was a little bit free and decided to explore some areas of Sharm el Sheikh. As we live in Nabq bay, I decided to go to Nabq Protectorate to explore the area especially I have never been there before. Nabq is famous for its big colony of Mangrove trees, the biggest in fact is in Indian Ocean. Yes, they are a lot there, not like Ras Mohammed, where there is just a small channel with trees
http://www.sharm-club.com/ras_mohamed.php

So in the morning, before the main heat I took my family, we got into our 4x4 Tiguan and moved to the destination. Well, the entrance or exit is just 10 minutes drive from our home, near el-Farana Heights hotel and behind Tiran hotel. So in 10 minutes we had to stop near a police check point and a ticket book-office to buy tickets. As we are considered to be locals, tickets were just 5LE per person + car. For tourists 5$ per person but from the 1st April will be 40LE.
My husband stayed around 10 more minutes discussing with the sales-man the situation, if someone comes to the area and so on. At the end we got some promotional booklets as being a Travel company.

We entered Nabq Protectorate and moved ahead, on the next check point we found some tourists on quads, having their Quad-biking adventure (http://www.sharm-club.com/quad_biking_sharm.htm), I thought about the same, to offer it to our guests, but later changed my mind. We moved deeper into the protectorate to discover nice places and beautiful beaches as I expected but I was really disappointed to see all that dirtiness, plastic pockets, trash and other things along the shore, and they call it PROTACTORATE! Ras Mohammed (http://www.sharm-club.com/ras.htm), if compare to Nabq is so clean and nice place to visit.

A group of bicyclists passed by us, they were coming back already :) Very good idea to explore the area on bicycles.

Mangroves

There is a nice, sandy beach in the beginning of the protectorate, but Bedouins or fishermen build huts along the shore and spoiled all the view as well as the beach, plastic pockets are everywhere. Than deeper inside the protectorate the cleaner the area in fact. As no one stays deep inside the area shore becomes cleaner and nicer to walk along, you can see some rare birds, such as osprey. I had an opportunity twice to take a close shot of the bird! but twice when i was ready to shoot it flew away. I took some pictures of them on the nest, there is a special area where some nests are equipped for the birds.
http://www.sharm-club.com/birds.htm

Maria Shroder ship wreck

Another interesting place of Nabq is a ship wreck of Maria Shroder, you can come very close to it to see the remains of the ship: "On 11 April 1956, while enroute from Aqaba, Jordan to West Germany, the ship ran aground on a reef at Nabq at position 28.10N/34.30E. Attempts to refloat the ship were unsuccessful and she was declared a total constructive loss." .
For Divers: The Wreck Today: The wreck of the Maria Schröder lies atop the reef approximately 100-meters offshore from what is now the Nabq Protactorate. Most of the ship is still above water with a debris trail located on the starboard side of ship which leads down to a depth of about 24 meters. At the base of the wreck in the surrounding coral there is a wide variety of aquatic life to be seen. The site is popular with bird-watchers and snorkelers and is on the tour route for local tourist agencies. Should you wish to visit it just book Tiran island boat trip from Sharm el Sheikh (http://www.sharm-club.com/tiran.htm)

Visitors center, view from the beach

Then we decided to visit Visitors center, my husband remember that when some years ago, around 5 years in fact, when he was used to come here as a guide, Visitors center was really an interesting place to come, to see its museum and to get some useful info. Now the center is abandoned, absolutely! We crossed the see or small lagoon to check the center and found abandoned building, I climbed up to see some panoramic views of the sea, saw some mangrove cannels ahead and the desert. 

Mangroves, how they grow

We continued after the Visitors center to another area of Mangroves,  my husband wanted to drive us as close to the trees as possible but when we moved along the shore and came close to the mud he noticed something strange … black spots started to move…. When I got out of the car and walked toward the trees I discovered that all the area, sand, mud… all is in halls, small crabs are living in the halls, but when we came closer they all disappeared. Later on we saw them again, we started to move with the car and saw from far away how black dots disappearing very fast, crabs were taking their claw away, hiding themselves down. Sometimes you can see it in Ras Mohammed as well, but not in SUCH quantity! Will be very interesting to put camera to take a video.

Spring, everything is blooming, even the desert!

On the way back we passed some nice plants blooming already in the middle of the desert. About flora of Egypt you can read on our site (http://www.sharm-club.com/flora.htm)

In general, it was a nice discovery, we saw something new but not virgin already as I expected, spoiled by people in fact, but if you are a bird watcher, then yes, it is a place to visit especially in the season you can find many birds there to watch. 

Fossil, I do believe, I found in the sea