Dahab, the Blue Hole and the Coloured Canyon: the jeep day, taken apart
Updated September 26, 2026 · 8 min read
North of Sharm El Sheikh the coast road runs up the Gulf of Aqaba to Dahab, and inland from it the sandstone breaks open into canyons. Selling that as a day trip is the second-biggest business in town after the boats: 15 Sinai day trips in our catalogue, from €14.70, median €38.72.
The problem is that four or five of them carry nearly the same title. Jeep, canyon, camel, snorkel, Dahab. They are not the same day, and the differences are not small.
Two trips, same words, different days
| Jeep adventure to Blue Hole, Canyon & Dahab | Jeep, Colored Canyon, Snorkel, Camel, ATV & Dahab | |
|---|---|---|
| Duration | 10 hours | 13 hours |
| From | €16.00 | €19.68 |
| Rating | 4.8 | 4.8 |
| Reviews | 618 | 1,154 |
| Blue Hole | in the itinerary, on selected options | not in the itinerary at all |
| Canyon named | “Colored Canyon” | “Salama Colored Canyon” |
| Snorkelling gear | not included | listed as included and as chargeable |
Three hours and under four euros apart, and almost everything that distinguishes them is buried below the fold on the booking page.
The Blue Hole. It is the thing most people picture when they book this day, and on the thirteen-hour trip it does not appear. That listing’s itinerary runs pickup, Red Sea, canyon, jeep, Dahab, camel, lunch, snorkelling, shopping, home. No Blue Hole. On the ten-hour trip it is there – but as “Blue Hole and Abu Galum (if option selected)”, which means it belongs to particular booking options rather than to the tour as such. Check which option you are clicking.
The canyon. One listing says “Colored Canyon”. The other says “Salama Colored Canyon”. These are not obviously the same place, and Sinai has several banded sandstone gorges at different distances from Sharm – which is also why you will find journey times from ninety minutes to three and a half hours quoted for “the” Coloured Canyon online. Before booking, read which canyon your listing actually names, and treat the total tour duration as the more reliable number.
The gear. This is the clearest example of why the included list and the fine print have to be read against each other. On the thirteen-hour trip, “snorkeling equipment” appears under what’s included. Further down the same page it then says:
Snorkeling equipment is mandatory for safety — you’re welcome to bring your own, or rent it on-site for an extra fee.
The listing contradicts itself. The ten-hour trip is at least consistent: gear is on the not-included list, full stop. Either way, the safe answer is to bring your own mask and snorkel from the hotel or budget cash for the rental.
See the ten-hour jeep day and its options
What the day is physically like
The ten-hour itinerary breaks down as roughly an hour in the van each way, two hours in the canyon, an hour in the jeep, an hour in Dahab, an hour at the Blue Hole, and three quarters of an hour for lunch in a Bedouin tent on the beach. The thirteen-hour version stretches the same shape.
The listings are blunt about the effort:
This trip involves off-road driving and moderate walking, especially in the Colored Canyon.
and on the longer trip, “the tour involves a lot of walking, so comfortable shoes are recommended”. The canyon is walked, not driven through. Both trips list themselves as not suitable for pregnant women, for people with mobility impairments and for wheelchair users; the ten-hour one adds people with heart problems. That addition is not decoration – an hour of off-road jeep track and two hours on uneven rock in the heat is a genuine load.
One more line worth having read in advance: “A life jacket is mandatory for the Blue Hole visit.” If somebody in your group refuses a life jacket on principle, that is a conversation to have at the hotel and not at the water’s edge.
Your entry stamp almost certainly covers this one
Unlike the Cairo trip, this day stays inside the area the free entry permit covers. The UK Foreign Office wording is:
If you are arriving by air to Sharm El-Sheikh and staying for less than 15 days at resorts in Sharm El Sheikh, Dahab, Nuweiba or Taba, you do not need a visa.
Dahab is named. That makes this the long day out that a visitor on the free stamp can realistically do, and it is the main practical reason to choose it over Cairo.
The separate question is travel advice rather than paperwork. The Foreign Office advises against all but essential travel to the northern part of South Sinai Governorate beyond the St Catherine–Nuweiba road, and explicitly excepts “the coastal areas along the west and east of the peninsula”. Dahab and the Blue Hole sit on the east coast, inside that exception. The canyon legs run inland. Which side of that line a specific route falls on is not something a booking page will tell you, so check the current advice for your own nationality before you book – it also affects whether your travel insurance responds. FCDO regional risks
Could you just drive it yourself?
For Dahab, the question is reasonable in a way it is not for Cairo. The van leg on the organised trip is about an hour each way on the coast road, the town is named in the permit wording above, and a car turns a fixed ten-hour package into a day you control – arriving at the Blue Hole outside the window when four tour buses are there is worth something.
The honest limits: the canyon is reached off-road in jeeps according to both itineraries, so that half of the day is not a self-drive proposition in a standard hire car. Fuel, insurance terms and where you are permitted to take the vehicle vary between suppliers, and an excess figure or a CDW exclusion that surprises you at the desk is expensive. Read those terms on the supplier’s own page rather than taking them from anyone’s article, including this one.
If a car is what you want, compare what is actually available for your dates: compare rental cars for Sharm El Sheikh.
When we would not book it
If your day already contains a long boat trip – two big days back to back is how people end a holiday tired rather than rested. If anyone in the group has a heart condition or back trouble, because the listing says so and the track agrees. And if the Blue Hole is the reason you are going: in that case do not book on the title, open the options, and confirm in writing that your selected option contains it.
If you want the desert without the distance, the quad tours run fifteen minutes behind the hotels – that is the quad safari. If you want the water instead, the reef day is Ras Mohammed and White Island.
