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Sudan - Xmas/New Year 2007/08
Posted by expiredmember on March 13th, 2007
Anyone want to get away for Xmas and New Year this year?
Brian Broadbridge, Charlie Stewart and I have found a great trip to the relatively un-dived reefs and wrecks off Sudan. It’s a 14 day liveaboard, departing 20 December from Port Ghaleb (with flight to Marsa Alam). The boat is Royal Evolution: check it out at www.royalevolution.com/default.aspx. It’s the 14 day Sudan itinerary out of Port Ghaleb. Returns to Port Ghaleb and back to the UK on 3 January 2008. Water temperature will be 25/26C (ish) - but above all, this is an opportunity to dive a part of the Red Sea that the crowds haven’t yet reached.
Cost will be £2,200 (full board etc. on the liveaboard as usual, except that beer and soft drinks are extra; last night in a hotel at Port Ghaleb). The trip is being booked through Oonasdivers.
As well as the three of us, several others have already expressed an interest. If you’re interested, drop me (or any of us) an email and we can fill you in on anything else you may want to know. (But note that Charlie will be away skiing for a week from Friday and I’ll be diving in Lembeh Straits from 22 March until 1 April).
March 15th, 2007 at 9:24 am
I am appaled that GLUG is even thinking about organising a trip to Sudan.
The Foreign Office advises against travel to most part of Sudan and of heightened terrorist threats. A UN report this week found that the Sudanese government is directly implicated in the genocide taking place in Darfur.
What next? GLUG trip to Burma? East Timor? Zimbabwe, maybe? Or even Somalia, Angola or Iran? All have lovely regimes too, and not a bloody hand in sight!
March 15th, 2007 at 8:57 pm
This is a matter of personal conscience.
I, of course, respect Adeline’s view. But I also think that in a club space such as this, a more measured and less emotional comment might be more in order and respectful in return. (There’s lots of other places we dive that you could question on various grounds; and where might you dive in Zimbabwe, Somalia, Angola and Iran anyway?)
For those who want to engage with this on a more rational basis, the Foreign Office advice is that you shouldn’t travel to most of inland Sudan. It doesn’t mention Port Sudan. We fly to Egypt and the boat embarks from and returns to Egypt. There is only a short stop in Port Sudan to get a visa, for which you don’t leave the port.
Three GLUG members have already put down a deposit on this trip. There are spaces free on the boat; but if you’re interested, don’t leave it too long as the flights to Marsa Alam are likely to fill up before the boat does.
March 15th, 2007 at 9:57 pm
I think it’s perfectly valid for Adeline to bring the political situation, and the FCO warning to everyone’s attention, but I don’t believe that the club has a duty to “censor” trips - if we did, then we’d probably have to prohibit trips to the Red Sea, most of the Caribbean and Latin America, and possibly the USA too!
On a personal level, I respect Adeline’s view, but I don’t see that this trip is really condoning the Sudanese government - it’s an Egyptian company, an Egyptian boat, and therefore the only money that will be going to the Sudanese government is the Visa fee. The Egyptian government, with it’s history of persecuting Gay Men, on the other hand, *will* be making money not only from Visa fees, but from the taxes the boat owner has to pay. If I can accept one, I can accept the other.
March 15th, 2007 at 11:04 pm
To follow up from both Alan and Neil’s reply.
First off all, I genuinely thank Ads for your comments on our trip which I find challenging but, I am happy to post the following.
I travel, as an ethical traveller, to the Sudan with a clear concience. As Neil pointed out, we will travel through Egypt who condem Homosexual sex and we continue to dive the Red Sea! With regards to the risk, as advised by The Foreign Office, I am personally happy to take that risk.
With regards to the political situation, why should Ahmed, the owner of the boat, be penalised for the appalling atrocities in Darfur? He has a business to run and a family to feed. As with Egypt, The Sudan rely on tourism, for income. The situation in Dafur can only be reconciled by diplomatic intervention either on a local level or by International intervention.
As someone who grew up in the deepest, dargest troubles in N. Ireland I know very well about what happens when the greater world no longer want to visit a country that has so much so offer.
March 16th, 2007 at 10:01 am
Thank you for your replies.
I think that this trip does merit a healthy debate about where we are prepared to dive and what we are prepared to ’swallow’ in order to do so. My comment was not a reflection on the individuals who are making the trip but on what types of trips Glug should endorse.I think being a GLT dive club, we should aim to dive as ethically as we can.
I take the point about Egypt but then, I haven’t dived or visited Egypt for the last three years for the very reason you have mentioned. I’m of the opinion that GLUG should actually consider not diving in Egypt but I recognise that it is the cheapest, nicest place to dive from the UK and that it is hard to be ethical all the time, especially if it means cutting your nose to spite the face. How efficient would a Glug boycott of Egypt be in the masses of other divers giving that country their diving money?
Sudan in contrast has a very small diving market.I think Sudan is the last place I would want to dive at the moment and while I appreciate that it is a liveaboard visit, I still think it give some recognition to a despicable regime. It is not because the victimes are at the other end of the country that they are less real. We are talking about a genocide of millions here, not a few gay men rounded up and thrown in jail (even though that is bad enough).
As for the boat owner, well, maybe he should take his business elsewhere.
And Alan, I know you can’t dive in Angola or Iran, I was making a point about similar types of horrible countries.
March 16th, 2007 at 11:22 am
Thanks Ads
Maybe we should consider a seperate meeting, from the committee meeting, to have that healthy debate! Lets run it by the committee at the next meeting on 3rd April.
Best wishes
Charlie