headerbeach.jpg


RED SEA CHRONICLES - DVD



RED SEA ADVENTURE


Take a look at Balmacara, a Corbin 39, running downwind in the Bab Al Mandeb.  There are forty-five knots of wind coming up the stern, short steep seas, blowing desert sand, and freighters in the haze  welcoming us to the Red Sea.  True Adventure.

The Bab Al Mandeb lies at the southern entrance of the Red Sea and is seventeen miles wide.  This patch of water won't disappoint you if what you're looking for is adventure.  The mountains on both sides of the Bab al Mandeb create a wind acceleration zone that frequently pumps the winds up to fifty knots.  And fifty knot winds in the desert would be incomplete unless they picked up some dust and created an awesome duststorm that reduces your visibility to less than a mile.  On top of that throw in a couple dozen freighters steaming by at full speed through the haze.  True Adventure.

Once you make it through the Bab, you can remain in the wind acceleration zone for as long as thirty-six hours if you are unlucky.  That means a relatively sleepless night as you bounce along in the darkness with steep seas coming up your stern, or your other choice is to anchor behind a headland in Eritrea, and immediately achieve the status of illegal alien.  True Adventure.



We chose to go the illegal alien route and anchor behind a deserted headland,  Ras Terma.  The last three miles to Ras Terma had 38 knots of wind on the nose, but with both Yanmars at full throttle, we put our anchor down in ten feet of water several hundred meters from the beach.  True Adventure.

Then came the full force of the sand storm.  For two days, stinging sand polished our bows and collected in our cockpit.  We could either sit inside the hot salon of our battened down cabin, or lounge in the cool and comfortable cockpit wearing sand goggles.  True Adventure.



When we were in Thailand planning the next leg of the circumnavigation, we had misgiving about sailing up the Red Sea.  We debated whether we should sail south around the Cape of Good Hope or face the rigors and rumors of Red Sea cruising.  We chose the Red Sea, we sailed through the Bab Al Mandeb, and we had a True Adventure


Red Sea Adventure Suakin the Fortress
Red Sea Rigors and Rumors Cruising Sudan
Never Surrender Sudanese Children
Red Sea Sunsets Abu Tig Marina - Egypt
Sudanese Donkey Barbers Red Sea Diving
Sudanese Water Truck Red Sea Sails - Kite Surfing
Red Sea Fishing Dhows Cruising the Pyramids
Terrorism is Pariah You're Not in Kansas Anymore
Cruising Yemen Red Sea Windsurfing
Up Close and Personal with Camels Cruising the Nile in a Felucca
Sudanese Boatyard That Sinking Feeling
Picasso's Boats Duetto - True Mariner
Stupid, Stupid, Stupid The Final Frontier