I know it's been a long time since I got a chance to blog, and we have done many things. I will try to remember and fill you in. I know it's after the fact, so many of the insights of the day may be lost, but at least it will give you a sense of what we did.
The day on the dive boat was wonderful. The weather and water were glorious. I hope my pictures capture the blues of the water. Ron did go scuba diving, and Dave was able to take some pictures of him underwater. When someone shows me how to upload them, I will post one. You leave on the boat at 9 AM and come back in at 4 P.M. Jen and I did go snorkeling and saw lots of fish and other creatures. On the boats, they do two dives, or snorkels, one in the morning, then you come back on the boat and eat lunch. You have to wait at least two hours between dives. I was amazed at what a great spread they put out for lunch...and we were so hungry! The food tasted divine! In the morning the water was much calmer and the snorkeling seemed easier. Then in the afternoon they moved to another spot, where the current was much stronger. In the afternoon, Jen decided that she was tired and didn't want to go again. It turned out to be very fortunate. A couple of girls and I went off with the guide. The current was so strong, and I consider myself a strong swimmer, but it was really hard navigating around in the water. The waves were quite large, and I felt like I was being bounced around like a ball. After awhile, the guide reached over and took my hand and kept hold of me, and we went together. That made things so much easier for me. He was able to guide me to places to see things. When I got on the boat, I told Ron..."I was never so glad to hold another man's hand!" It was a treat to see Dave go diving and I took lots of pictures. He gets an award for his patience having Mom take all those pictures.
After we got in, at 6 P.M., we caught a bus from his home town back to Cairo, which got us in about 1:30-2:00 A.M. We had time to grab a couple of hours sleep, before we caught a ride by private taxi for the 7 hour ride to Nuweiba. That is where you catch the ferry to Jordan. There is only one ferry a day, and you can't buy your tickets ahead of time, so we wanted to get there early to be sure to get a ticket. We did manage to get tickets, and the 3:00 P.M. ferry finally left at 5:30 for the two hour ride to Jordan. The difference between Egypt and Jordan is like night and day. At a later time when I have had time to process things, I might elaborate. After we got through customs, we caught another taxi for the two hour ride up to Petra. We never had reservations anywhere, what you do is just ask the taxi driver, and he recommends someplace and takes you there. By the time we arrived, we were exhausted and fell into bed. Often, during the trip, I would ask Dave specific questions about when or where something would take place...his standard answer was always..."we'll figure it out". I now have a much better understanding of what that means!!
The next morning we were up early and off to Petra which was just a short walk from our hotel. We arrived just after 7 in the morning. A friend had told us that she thought half a day was enough, so we scheduled our ride back to the ferry at 3 that afternoon. When we started, that seemed like lots of time, but as the day went on, we soon realized that we could have spent several days there. We did manage to see most of it, and Dave and Ron enjoyed climbing all over the place. I think this was the first place on our trip that Dave had not already seen. I took so many pictures, but none of them will do it justice. The different colors in the rock are truly unbelievable! We got back to the hotel just in time to catch our taxi back down to be close to the ferry, so we would be able to get off in the morning. Early the next morning, we went over to the ferry and got tickets for the 11AM ferry back to Egypt. It boarded just about 11:30, which we didn't think was too bad. Then we sat there for a long time, and finally it left about 1:30. We arrived back in Egypt around 4:30. The ferry ride was an adventure in itself, but I'll leave that till I can talk to you personally. Once back in Egypt, we caught another minibus which took us to Saint Katherine's monastary in the Sinai. When we arrived a couple of hours later, we were thrilled to find out that we were in time for dinner. Never did food taste so good to me!
Dave arranged a guide for us to climb Mount Sinai the next morning to see the sunrise. You meet your guide at 2 AM to begin your climb. As we started, the guide asked whether we would like to take the steps or the trail. For some reason, I thought the steps sounded easier. He said that it was was shorter. Well, my first clue should have been that there were NO OTHER people on the steps. It wound up being 3,750 steps to the top. I use the terms steps very loosely, it was more like rocks placed here and there or flat places cut out of the rock. They were in no way uniform!!! It was a full moon, which made it nice, but it was still a tough climb. I had to stop often to rest, but we made it to the top! Whether you take the steps or trail (which is much more gradual), you still come to a place where you have to climb the last 750 steps. They are called the steps of Repentence, which were laid by a monk. I think they are aptly named, for one would repent of anything if you were promised that you didn't have to climb those steps again. We got to the top around 5:15 and then you wait for the sunrise. There is a person renting camel blankets at the top of the mountain to ward off the chill and winds, which I felt were cheap at twice the price! We had a great view of the sunrise, then about 7 AM, headed back down the mountain. Needless to say, we took the trail down. As I came to find out almost everyone takes the trail up and down. We got back down the mountain just in time for breakfast. We relaxed in the afternoon and then later walked into town. It was so nice to walk on something LEVEL!! After dinner, we played hearts in our room. The next morning we arranged a tour of the monastary, with one of the tourist police there. He was great, and we really enjoyed our time. We saw the burning bush which they say is a cutting from the original burning bush that Moses saw. The burning bush didn't look anything like I had imagined it. I will try to include a picture next time. He even took us into the beginning part of where the monks live, leading us through a secret passage that the monks would use to escape the monastary in case it was being attacked. That was something the average tourist certainly doesn't see. We finished up around noon, then caught a minibus for the 6 1/2 hour ride back to Cairo. We arrived back, packed up all our things, then went out for a nice dinner. We had a couple of hours to relax before we caught our taxi ride at 1 AM out to the airport. Our flight was at 4 AM, so we had to be at the airport at 2 AM. We slept most of the first leg of our trip to Amsterdam. One of the things that had escaped my attention was that we had a 6 hour layover in Amsterdam, before continuing to Dulles. I must say that was the longest 6 hours of our lives. We arrived in Dulles in late afternoon local time, but the middle of the night our body time. By the time we got through customs, etc, it was a couple of hours later. We were going to stay with friends up in Fairfax, but we were sick and didn't want to expose them, so we called and they graciously brought our car out to the airport and parked it in hourly parking, so we could pick it up and just head on down the road. We will be grateful to them forever!!! We made it about an hour before we had to find a hotel and stop for the night. NEVER has a nights sleep felt so good!
We got home Monday afternoon, and I think I have been sleeping ever since then. I could not have imagined how tough the jet lag would be coming this way! I don't plan on doing anything until next week. Ron came down with the intestinal upset the day before we left, and I came down with the same thing Monday night. We both feel completely exhausted. I am so grateful that we did not get this at the beginning of our trip. We still can't figure out how this happened, because we never drank the water, or anything like that, but at this point it's irrelevant. I cannot tell you how good it is to be home!
Seeing and being with Dave was the highlight of our trip. All the sights were enjoyable, but they palled in comparison with being with him! As I've said before, I am amazed at his language skills and could not be more proud of him!
I haven't had a chance to process things since we've been home. The culture is so entirely different, that it will take me awhile to sort out my thoughts and feelings, if indeed I am ever really able to do so. At the moment, I feel like I am still in sensory overload!
Sorry I wasn't able to blog that last week, but as you can tell from our schedule, there really wasn't much time or opportunity. As I read back over what I wrote, I begin to get tired all over again. It was a busy schedule, but necessary to see everything I wanted to see. I kept telling myself, I can sleep when I get home...and that's all I've done since Monday afternoon.
This is such a long post, that some of you may have fallen asleep in the middle. :) In conclusion, I want to thank all of you again so much for your prayers on our behalf. There is no way that I can tell you what a difference that made in our trip!
Talk to you later...
Musing Mom
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