Heading South

Ok, now it's time to play catch up on our trip down south. I wish I could post all the pictures of everyone, but I haven't uploaded them online yet - I'll let you know when I do. The first place we stopped on our trip was at Qumran, the location of a monastic-like, religious sect of Jews who copied and studied the Scriptures, eventually hiding the Dead Sea Scrolls in the caves nearby. The climb up to those caves provides a breathtaking view of the Dead Sea and the valley below. When we climbed down, however, we were greeted by a park ranger who asked if we had read the signs at the beginning of the trail. We had glanced but hadn't stopped to read them, and he told us that they warned against hiking the trails because of the danger. "There can be a fine of up to $200 for hiking in restricted areas," he said as he led us toward the signs. "Here it says..." he paused to find the place. Unable to find it on that sign, he began to walk a couple feet over to the next one. "It must be on this one that it states..." once again he paused. There was no restriction warning on either sign. "Well, I won't take you up to that sign," he pointed to a small green sign a couple hundred yards up that path and around the curve, "that designates those trails as restricted." Poor guy - it's hard to prove your point when you can't find the restriction. We looked properly chastised and continued on our way.

At En Gedi, we hiked as well, only in non-resticted areas of course, but here we added swimming. The numerous pools with waterfalls pouring into them provided the perfect place to escape from the heat.

Across the highway from En Gedi, there was access to the Dead Sea, complete with showers, beach chairs and umbrellas, and a life guard in case you are unable to swim and happened to sink down to the bottom and drown. :) I've never been very good at treading water, but in this sea, I had most of my shoulder above water when I was floating upright. We all experimented with different positions, floating and bobbling effortlessly in the water. Eventually, the previously overlooked cuts, blisters, and razorburn burst into flames all over our bodies and chased us into the refuge of the showers.

From there we headed down to Eilat, located on the southern tip of Israel and on the shores of the Red Sea. The three hour drive through the desert was long and kind of tense as there were many slow trucks to pass and few, clear straight of ways on which to do it. We arrived safely at our destination, praise the Lord, and found our hotel. From our balcony, we had a breathtaking view of the city of Eilat, Jordan's port city of Aquaba, and the Red Sea.

That night we went to the most amazing restaurant (-if you are a meat lover, that is. If you are a vegetarian, this place definitely is not for you.). They had an option called 11 kinds of meat. You received a coaster-like cardboard disc that was red on one side and green on the other. When you were ready to start, you turned the disc so that the green side was up. That signalled the waiters to stop by your table. After stopping by the open grill at the side of the entrance, they walked around the dining carrying a variety of meats on huge skewers. Chicken, steaks, sausages, and fillets, they stopped by your table offering their meat. If you wanted it, they would shave you off a piece, and if it didn't interest you, you could wait for the next kind to be brought out. Annette discovered that chicken liver isn't, and never will be, for her. For some reason, we never received a red/green disc so our light was always green!