&travels: Red Sea ramblings

Electrical box, Eilat, Israel

It's been a busy, busy week, with a full-on Jewish tour of Istanbul courtesy of the excellent Linda Naon; an uber-opulent night at the Hotel Les Ottomans followed by a somewhat more chilled out night at Sumahan on the Water, on the Asian side of the Bosphorus; a lovely meal Carne, the meat-intensive kosher restaurant in the middle of Istanbul; and a warm, relatively easy Yom Kippur in the always stunning Jerusalem. Other incidental highlights have been Aleppan-pastry making with Naava's aunt Riza, wandering the traffic-free streets of Jerusalem (during the fast) and breaking the fast with plenty of food and family.

Corn on the cob, Sultanahmet, Istanbul, Turkey

Les Ottomans lobby, Istanbul, Turkey

Making cherry liquor on the windowsill, Istanbul Jewish Old Age Home, Galata, Istanbul

Kosher butcher Yusuf Nalbant, Galata, Istanbul

The little boat that took us to Sumahan on the Water, as seen from our room, Cengelkoy, Istanbul, Turkey

Now we're in Eilat, four hours of desert backdrop from the centre of Israel, and almost totally removed from all political, military and social context. The tiny, wedge-tail of land between Jordan and the Egyptian Sinai is all about fun in the sun, whether you have rocks and sand or water and coral underfoot, with all the chintzy Surfers Paradise glitz and glamour, and none of the fine, soft, inviting beaches.
Since it's Israel, if you want to avoid the bottle tops, broken glass, cigarette butts and the occasional nappy jellyfish, you have to part with some shekels and chill at a private beach. We spent an afternoon snorkelling and sunning ourselves at Coral Beach, where if you stay in the buoy-marked swimming pens (really) then you don't get yelled at by the dude with the megaphone watching from the tower. If you're drowning, by the way, he's not getting wet, such is the notice on said tower.
Anyway, the water's super tame and you're not going to get into trouble, and we saw lots of brightly coloured fish. Nice.
Tomorrow we're off across the border to Petra, a two-hour drive from Eilat, for a full-day tour. For all of you who know how debilitatingly anal we (Naava) are about planning our trips, this is, in fact, an incredible moment of spontenaiety!
And with that, we are off to search for falafel in town.