Snorkeling In Hurghada and Dolphin Spotting, Egypt

Our 16 day vacation to Egypt wouldn’t have been complete without snorkeling In Hurghada, as well as being lucky to spot wild dolphins in the Red Sea. This was at the end of our vacation in Egypt so it was one of the last water activities we enjoyed. Enjoying a private boat to the snorkeling area and a private beach, we had a lot of fun.

This snorkeling In Hurghada and dolphin spotting took place in October 2018.

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Where We Stayed In Hurghada

During our 4 nights stay in Hurghada, we booked a room at Hotel Steigenburger. It was the perfect location to stay at after our 2 weeks itinerary touring through Egypt. It gave us all the relaxation we needed after seeing all the temples, pyramids and historical sites. You can read all about our stay at the hotel on our ‘Where to Stay In Egypt‘ post!

Day Trip With Our Hotel

We took a day trip organised by our hotel. We had seen a leaflet during breakfast and thought about it for another day as it can be a bit costly. However since my partner had never done snorkelling or diving before, we didn’t want to miss this opportunity to snorkel in the red sea! A day later we easily booked the day trip at their desk area, since they are there daily.

They have a private pier to the boats allowing you to easily start the trip after breakfast. Once we were ready, we headed down to the boat with our belongings to meet up with the crew and other travellers.

Our boat had a total of 3 crew members, a driver who was also a diver, a cameraman who works for the hotel to take photos and a video and a guy who was helping us with our gear and preparing lunch. As for the passengers, it was us, a family of four and another couple. So max 8 people to our boat, which was great! I think the limit was 10 travellers since it wasn’t the largest boat from the hotel.

They also have diving tours with groups and then you would have been on a bigger boat since they have a lot more diving gear to snorkelling gear. However it did also look about 8-10 people per group.

Private Beach With Hotel Steigenburger

Heading out with the boat, Hotel Steigenburger owns a private beach on the Giftun Island in the Red Sea. This was our first stop with the boat as this was included in our snorkelling day trip. Here the water was perfectly clear and a nice place to relax while lunch was being prepared on the boat.

Snorkelling In Hurghada

Snorkeling In Hurghada was really nice on our day trip, allowing us plenty of time to snorkel in a small group along the coral areas. The first snorkelling area was a bit busy with tourists so there were times we were just floating around until we could swim further. But that didn’t last too long.

The second snorkelling area was much better and more quiet. We could also spread out more taking our time and seeing more of one coral or the other. Here we were super lucky to see a sea turtle swimming next to us! Such an amazing experience to see this beautiful reptile in person.

What we had to take:

• Towel from hotel
• Own belongings such as suncream, sunglasses, camera etc

What we were provided:

• Our snorkelling set goggles and flippers (included in price)
• Lunch and drinks

*Underwater photos were taken by someone else during our snorkeling In Hurghada trip. 

TIP: For your visit to Egypt, we can highly recommend the Lonely Planet Egypt Travel Guide! We used it before the trip for research to the end of our trip daily. It was highly valuable to have along the way of our full vacation. A must buy for all who are wanting to travel to Egypt!

Dolphin Spotting In Hurghada

During our day tour snorkeling In Hurghada we were told that we might be able to spot dolphins, as it was the start of the season and they had seen them the day before. This was not a promise but they were feeding in the area so if they were about, the boat would hang around the area to see them.

The dolphins were great to see in the wild, however it did become a bit busy with a few boats following them. But they seemed to happily swim alongside the boats like they were playing.

Read more of our Egypt posts!

The Ultimate Egypt 16 Day Itinerary

Where To Stay In Egypt: Giza, Luxor, Nile Cruise, Aswan and Hurghada

Nile Cruise Views: Life On The Nile River PHOTOBLOG

Egyptian Exhibition At The Rijksmuseum van Oudheden

Valley Of The Kings Must See Tombs

Best and Worst Experiences in Egypt

Tips:

• If you have the chance to snorkel in a place like the red sea – do it while you still can! Else scuba diving looked pretty tempting too.
• Make sure you don’t leave any rubbish behind on the beach areas
• When snorkelling, do not touch any of the coral. Respect the area!

Have you ever been Snorkeling In Hurghada? Let us know in the comments!