El Gouna, Egypt.
A billionaire lived in the desert, and like many billionaires he was bored, constantly thinking how to spend his money. Sure enough, he traveled a lot and had seen many beautiful places in the world, but once upon a time, he came to Venice, Italy, and fell in love with this amazing and unusual city. (Hell, who wouldn’t?) Then, he decided to build a second Venice in his motherland, Egypt, and call it El Gouna, the Lagoon.
The shore of the Egyptian Red Sea has no natural lagoons. That’s why Samih Sawiris, our creative billionaire, decided “to carve” them right into the desert coast not far from the city of Hurghada. Definitely, it was not only a dream, but also a business project, and he chose a coast with a rich coral reef. He dug canals in the desert and created artificial islands, peninsulas, and lagoons where the city of El Gouna was built. All the channels were dug by hand (not by Mr. Sawiris, of course).
