Taba occupies Egypt's far north-eastern corner, the point where the Sinai runs out against the head of the Gulf of Aqaba and three other countries crowd the same horizon. It is a place defined by edges and views: sheer desert mountains drop to a slim, sheltered bay, resort beaches line the shore, and the water is calm and deep blue. The mood is more polished than the Bedouin camps further south — this is resort country — yet the setting is dramatic, with a Crusader island offshore and a frontier crossing that has long made Taba a gateway as much as a destination.

The signature sight lies just out in the gulf: Pharaoh's Island, crowned by the restored fortress that Saladin held in the 12th century, its ramparts rising straight from the rock and reachable by short boat trips for a wander through the battlements. On the mainland, the resorts of Taba Heights cluster along the coast, served by a cable car that lifts you to a viewpoint over the bay, while the diving and snorkelling on the local reefs are excellent. Inland, the slot of Fjord Bay is a postcard curve of turquoise hemmed by cliffs, one of the most photographed corners of the Sinai coast.

The view comes into its own after sunset. From Castle Zaman, a stone-built restaurant set high on a clifftop, you look out over the gulf as the lights come on — and on a clear night you can pick out the shores of Israel, Jordan and Saudi Arabia ringing the same stretch of water, four countries from a single balcony. It is an unhurried, slightly surreal pleasure: dinner above the dark sea, the mountains at your back, and a constellation of foreign coastlines glittering across the bay.