The Sinai peninsula has been the gateway between Africa and Asia since time immemorial and a battleground for millennia. Prized for its strategic position and mineral wealth, Sinai is also revered by disparate cultures as the site of God's revelation to Moses, the wanderings of Exodus and the flight of the Holy Family. As Burton Bernstein wrote, "it has been touched, in one way or another by most of Western and Near Eastern history, both actual and mythic", being the supposed route (there's no archeological proof) by which the Israelites reached the Promised Land and Islam entered North Africa, then a theatre for Crusader-Muslim and Arab-Israeli conflicts, and finally transformed into an internationally monitored demilitarized zone.

 

Though mostly wilderness, Sinai looks far too dramatic - and too beautiful - to be dismissed as "24,000 square miles of nothing". The interior of southern Sinai is an arid moonscape of jagged ranges harbouring Mount Sinai and St Catherine's Monastery , where pilgrims climb the Steps of Repentance from the site of the Burning Bush to the summit where God delivered the Ten Commandments. Further north, the vast Wilderness of the Wanderings resembles a Jackson Pollock canvas streaked with colour and imprinted with tank tracks. The Sinai is also home to a remarkably high number of plants and wildlife; over sixty percent of Egypt's plant life thrives in this area, and thirty-three species are unique to the Sinai. Among a number of mammals that inhabit the region are the hyena, ibex and the rabbit-like hyrax. Venture into this "desert" on a camel trek or jeep safari and you will also find remote springs and lush oases, providing some insights into Bedouin culture .

Above all, however, the south has the lure of exquisite coral reefs and tropical fish in the Gulf of Aqaba , one of the finest diving and snorkelling grounds in the world. The beach resorts at Sharm el-Sheikh , Na'ama Bay , Dahab and Nuweiba cater to every taste and budget. From Sharm or Na'ama Bay you can also make expeditions to Egypt's deepest reefs and most diverse aquatic life at Ras Mohammed , a mini-peninsula at the southern tip of Sinai. Northwest of here, the Gulf of Suez pales by comparison with its eastern counterpart - there are no reefs and only a few sites to interest the visitor.

Northern Sinai is visited by almost no Western tourists, although in summer it fills up with Egyptian holidaymakers. A barren coastline, which you scarcely glimpse from the road, it has a single town and focus in El-Arish , a laid-back if conservative place with a palm-fringed beach and a Bedouin market.