Jerusalem (1.19 – 1.21)

Crossing into Israel was… interesting, to put it lightly. Once actually at the Israeli border, which was a bus ride removed from the Jordan exit border, the process to get into Israel was confusing, never explained, and in many ways felt like a personal attack. Luckily, the process went fairly smoothly, and I was not detained for three hours of questioning, unlike Juanita (my friend from Dahab) when she crossed into Israel. I was assaulted with questions, asked firmly and accusingly: WHAT IS YOUR PURPOSE OF COMING TO ISRAEL? WHERE ARE YOU STAYING? DO YOU HAVE A RESERVATION? HOW LONG WILL YOU BE STAYING? DO YOU KNOW ANYONE IN ISRAEL? ARE YOU SURE YOU’RE ONLY GOING TO JERUSALEM? WHERE ARE YOU GOING AFTER ISRAEL? HOW DO YOU KNOW THIS PERSON IN CAIRO? ARE YOU SURE YOU DON’T KNOW ANYONE IN ISRAEL? And then, finally, OK, CAN I STAMP YOUR PASSPORT? I replied ‘Yes,’ and was through immigration. I collected my bag, and then waited for my Polish friends to also make it through. We exchanged some money, got on a minibus headed for Jerusalem, and opted to stick together. The bus dropped us off and we walked a few minutes to a cheap hostel recommended by the guidebook. It was easy to find, but once there we discovered that the prices were double what was quoted in the book. I think that what happens quite often in the case of a recommendation like this, is that the hostel knows that it has guaranteed business, so raises the prices and/or rests on their laurels, and the quality of service degrades. We decided to stay, despite having to pay more than anticipated. Once our bags were left in the room, we left in search of food. After eating, we entered the Damascus Gate into the Old City and walked around for a while. We stopped at a sweet shop, and then for coffee in order to get a well needed pick-me-up before we began the free tour that started at 2:30PM.
The tour was extensive, and we covered a great deal, including the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, allegedly built at the location where Christ was crucified. One dome of the church marks the spot of his crucifixion, and another marks where he was resurrected. I do not say ‘allegedly’ to cause offense to anyone, I say this because this is not the only place in Jerusalem that claims to be the site of Golgotha. We saw the four quarters of the Old City: The Jewish Quarter, The Christian Quarter, The Muslim Quarter, and The Armenian Quarter. We saw the Dome on the Rock, and visited the Wailing Wall, or the Western Wall, as it is also known. By the end of the tour, we had seen a great deal of the Old City, and it was dark out. We went for a drink with the group from the tour, and then went and got cheap pizza… there is little in Jerusalem that IS cheap. Afterwards, we headed back to the hostel and called it a night.
On Wednesday, I decided to head to the Dead Sea; the weather was poor, but I hoped to be able to swim. As I was unsure whether the weather would allow for me to take a dip, I decided that I would visit the first town on the Dead Sea, which is called Qumran. The other towns are bigger, but take far longer to get to. Monika and Gregor warned that the place where they had gone took three hours to reach, and I didn’t feel like investing that much time. I arrived in Qumran, and went to the visitor center. I toured the grounds where a great number of ancient scrolls were found, which is what Qumran is known for. I asked if I could swim, and one woman told me no. Another man told me that I could if I walked down to specific beach areas, but he told me that he thought they would be closed and the whole area would be dangerous due to the severe weather that they’d had. I was disappointed, but headed to the bus stop to wait for return bus to Jerusalem. Once back, I took the bus back to the hostel, from where I planned on getting a mini-bus into Bethlehem. The buses were a mess, and it took me ages to finally get back. By the time I finally returned, it was nearly getting dark, and I was exhausted, so felt that a trip across the Palestinian border into Bethlehem wasn’t the best idea. I ventured out in search of food, and spent a quiet night in the hostel.
On Thursday morning, I woke around 5:30AM, gathered my things and got a taxi to the bus station to begin what would prove to be a very long day of travel, with the aim of getting to Cairo. The bus left at 7AM, and headed for Eilat, the border into Taba, Egypt. The bus arrived just shy of noon, and from the bus station I got a taxi to the border, where the fun began… but I’ll talk about that in the Egypt entry.

The Damascus Gate from the New City into the Old City

The sweet shop… god, I could have eaten everything in the place

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The cross you see on top of the dome marks the purported location of Golgotha.

The Wailing/Western Wall

A view of the Mount of Olives

The Dead Sea

Egypt week one up next…

Leaving on a jet plane

Today is my last full day in Egypt, and I’m sad to be leaving tomorrow. I’ve had an absolutely incredible time here and will be especially sad to leave Sara; she’s amazing.

So, back to England I go… for four days, and then it’s off to Germany… and then Guernsey, followed by Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Russia, and Latvia.

Jordan (1.15 – 1.19)

Due to the absolute clusterf**k that was the Nuweiba port, I arrived in Jordan later than intended. I had planned on traveling onto Petra that night, but was told that the buses don’t run that late in the day. That being the case, I asked Feargus and Nathan if they’d want to get a place to stay in Aqaba for the night, and stick together for the sake of getting a cheaper room. They were all for it, so we got a taxi from the port to the cheapest hotel in the guide book. Once our backpacks were thrown to the ground, we left to get dinner at a restaurant right below our hotel, whose food smelt fantastic. After dinner, we walked around town and ended up at a coffee shop where we watched one of the Africa Cup of Nations football games. After that, we decided it was due time to call it a night, as we were all planning on taking early morning buses to other places.
On Saturday morning, we woke up and all walked to the bus station. Feargus checked on the status of a bus to Wadi Rum, and Nathan and I found a bus headed for Petra. We went for a quick breakfast, and bid Feargus farewell. I slept for most of the two hour journey to Petra, and once there, Nathan and I got beds for the night at a place called Valentine Inn. If you’re ever in Petra and in need of a cheap place to stay, I cannot recommend this place enough. We threw our bags down, and headed for Petra. We arrived around noon, and entered the grounds. The walk through the Siq, the passage created by a shift in the Tectonic Plates that caused the mountain to split, took us about half an hour, at which point we caught our first glimpse of the Treasury, which is the best known part of Petra. We spent a while ’Oohing’ and ’Aahing’ at this truly magnificent testament to the capabilities of man, and then walked further into the remains of this ancient city. We spent five hours there total, venturing as far as the temples at the bottom of the valley. On the way down, a young Bedouin girl snared me into buying some necklaces from her; she was beautiful. She told us she went to school during the week, was twelve years old, and spoke Arabic, English and Spanish. It broke my heart to see her working, as my little sister was only a few days shy of twelve years old, and I couldn’t bear the thought of her having to work. We spoke to her for a while before heading onwards.
The whole day was magnificent, and the weather was beautiful… you’ll see for yourself in the photos below. What I found most astonishing was the enormity of the city. The tombs are countless, and the architecture seems to stretch on endlessly. What I find to be most incredible about the city, is that just about everything you see was used as a tomb, and from what I understand, the inhabitants of the city lived in tents. None of the rooms were used as functional living quarters!

By five, we were quite tired, and found our way to the entrance gate to catch the free ride back to the hotel. We showered, internetted, and then enjoyed the buffet dinner that was on offer for a mere 4 Jordanian Dinars (about $6.50). Full of good food, I settled to watch the nightly screening of ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,’ shown in every cheap hotel in town, due to the fact that the Treasury is featured in a scene near the film’s end. Once the film was over, it was time to call it a night, as Nathan and I had a second day of exploring Petra ahead of us.
On Sunday, we woke at a leisurely pace as we were in no particular hurry to get anywhere. We ate lunch, and headed back to Petra once more. We arrived around 11AM, and proceeded to spend the next six hours there. We headed immediately down to the lowest part of the valley, and then to the small and fairly uninspiring Archaeological museum, and then onto the Monastery. The climb up the Monastery took about an hour and involved over 800 tiring steps; we refused the persistent offers of mules to make the journey for us. Once up the mountain, it was clear that the climb had been worth it; the view was magnificent. The façade of the Monastery is even bigger than that of the Treasury, though less ornate; it was absolutely spectacular. From there, we climbed further, to a summit offering a view of ‘The End of the World.’ Nathan chatted with a Bedouin man who told us he had three children, though he wasn’t done yet because he wanted at least seven, but no less than fourteen! After taking in the view, we decided to head back down the mountain. Once we had finished our descent, it was time to head back to the entrance to catch the 5PM van back to the hotel.
Back at the hotel, we spent the rest of the night in a fashion almost identical to that of the night before. I showered, again enjoyed the cheap buffet dinner, chatted with friends back home, and watched Indiana Jones once more. Before the ritual showing of the film, Nathan and I walked down to the corner shop to buy drinks and snacks. In the few minutes that we had been gone, an electrical fire had started on one of the power lines, a mere 300 ft away from the hotel. As we walked back up the hill, fire trucks and police cars raced by us. Confused, we followed the sirens and flashing lights, and joined a crowd of people that had gathered to watch the fire. After gawking for a few minutes, we walked back to the hotel, and within minutes of our arrival, the power was shut off so that the firefighters could properly handle the situation. I wished I had my flashlight with me, but unfortunately, I had lost it on the journey up Mount Sinai. Luckily, within twenty minutes, the power was back on, and everyone got back to business… the movie began. We went to sleep fairly early, as Nathan and I were heading to Amman in the morning. I planned on heading from there to Jerusalem. That night it rained heavily, and I thought to myself how lucky our timing was, as Petra would be nowhere near as pleasant the next day, especially if the rain didn’t let up… which it didn’t.
I slept uneasily, worried that I wouldn’t wake to my alarm clock, and we would consequently miss the bus to Amman; per usual, I had nothing to worry about. We woke, packed our bags, and went to wait for the bus. The journey was uneventful, and I slept on and off for its duration. By 11AM, we were there. We were dropped at a bus depot, and I was informed that I wouldn’t be able to catch a bus to the border at this time, and I could either pay for a taxi, or I could wait until the next day. I decided to stick around in Amman for the night, and spent another day with Nathan. He knew a place with rooms for 5JD, so off we went. With bags deposited in the room, we walked through the city to see what it had to offer… which, honestly, is not much at all. We grabbed shwarma and cokes for lunch, paying a measly 2JD total for the both of us… though Amman was fairly unexciting, at least it was cheap. We made our way to the Roman Amphitheater, exploring that and the museum of Jordanian tradition for a while. We then wandered around town for a while; I found that I was exhausted so decided to head back to the hotel for a nap… that lasted five hours! Upon waking, we left in search of food, to discover that the heavens had opened, and the streets were flooding… the storm drains were overflowing! We went to a restaurant and ate; the meal was mediocre, but filling. We then went in search of a coffee shop, and were surprised to discover that by 9PM, the streets were dead. We found a coffee shop, and passed the time there, headed back to the hotel and went to bed.
Tuesday morning came, and Nathan and I checked out of the room, headed off in separate directions. He was leaving for Syria, to go and study Arabic for a few months, and I was heading to Jerusalem. I was picked up by a taxi driver, who then swung by another hotel to pick up a group of Polish people who I’d met the day before; he was going to drive us to the border. He drove us about halfway there, and then we changed over to another taxi that drove us the rest of the way. Only certain government licensed taxis are allowed to drive to the Jordanian-Israeli border. Once there, we had to go through the whole passport song and dance, and then we were on a bus, headed for the border into Israel.

The walk down to the Siq (the passageway leading to the famous, and best known feature of Petra, the Treasury)

Nathan and I, about to start walking through the Siq

The Siq is a natural split in the sandstone, which forms the entryway to the ancient city

The very first view of the Treasury; I gasped aloud when I saw!

The Treasury; it is staggeringly magnificent and ornate.

Me! In front of the Treasury!

An example of the elaborate detail in the facade of the Treasury

The Aneisho Tomb

A spacious cave, with a particularly beautiful entrance

Hangin’ out in a cave

A facade to one of the many burial tombs

The Corinthian Tomb

Full view of The Palace Tomb

Part of The Palace Tomb

The front of The Palace Tomb

Nathan!

From left to right: The Palace Tomb, The Corinthian Tomb, The Silk Tomb, and The Urn Tomb

An elephant, topping one of the columns in the Great Temple

A fallen column, in the Great Temple

More of the Great Temple

Qasr Al-Bint, or “The Castle of Pharaoh’s Daughter”

The Treasury a few hours before sunset. The colors are less vivid because it isn’t in the sunlight, but it was deserted save for the two tourist police officers.

A view of Wadi Musa, the city outside Petra, on the walk to down to the monument

It blows my mind that plant-life can grow on the side of a rock. As it’s Winter, its branches are bare; I’d love to see it in the summer.

A photo of the Treasury on Sunday morning, fairly devoid of people

A camel!

A view from the journey up to the Monastery

El Dier, or The Monastery. It boasts the largest facade, and like most of the other buildings in Petra, was also built as a tomb. It wasn’t until the Christians came in 4th Century AD that it was used as a Monastery.

A view from the side. It so quickly disappears as you walk away from it. It’s quite incredible to think you could, theoretically, be so close to it and never know it was there.

“WELCOME In End Of The World”

The view at “The End of the World”

The amphitheater in Amman

Next up, stories from Jerusalem!

Sinai (OK, mostly Dahab) (1.09 – 1.15)

I’ve had this entry written for nearly a week now, but I’ve had hugely unreliable internet, if that, so updating with pictures was kind of out of the question. Better late than never, yes? Yes.

So, as I mentioned in my previous post, getting to Egypt was far more difficult than it should have been. The flight got into Sharm El-Sheikh three and a half hours late, which was sorely inconvenient as well as just being infuriating. I cleared customs and then had to go about getting a taxi to the youth hostel in town. The taxis were eager to rip me off… no surprise there. They wanted to charge 250 Egyptian Pounds for a taxi ride that was 14 km in total. I’ll give you some conversion rates here. 1USD = 5.5 LE (Egyptian Pounds). 1 km = 0.62 miles. SO. That’s about $45.50 for a taxi ride less than 9 miles. When I instantly told him no way, he tried to say “No, no, it’s not very much. Many Egyptian Pounds are not many English Pounds.” I quickly retorted than I knew EXACTLY what the exchange rates were and that was far, far too much money. I knew I should pay about 30LE for the ride, which he also tried to insist was over 30 km. “No, no. It’s very far, very far.”
After a fair bit of messing around, I said “If you’re going to lie to me, then we’re done talking. I’ll find someone else.” and proceeded to walk away. Before long, I was able to get them down to 50LE, which is still more than I should have paid, but far better than the 250LE that they thought they were going to get away with. As it turned out, no one had ever heard of the youth hostel where I was planning to stay. I was dropped off on the street where it should have been, and reluctantly, I ended up staying in a hotel for 200LE for the night. I can’t afford prices like this, but I needed somewhere to stay for the night.
In the morning I checked out and found a Starbucks, which basically guarantees internet. After some internetting, it became clear that the alleged hostel should have been exactly where I was looking for it. I consulted the guidebook which informed me that if you are looking for budget travel, then you need to get out of Sharm El-Sheikh , but Dahab, an hour and a quarter up the coast was the place to be. I attempted to find the hostel once more, in vain, and then conceded to the fact that I would need to move onto Dahab. I got a taxi to the station and had to wait for a while, but while there, I met a woman from New Zealand. As it turned out, we were both heading for Dahab, and were both planning to stay at the same place. Friends we became! Once the bus came, everything went smoothly from that point on. We got to the Dahab bus station, got a taxi to Penguin Village, and checked in. Once we’d dumped our bags in our rooms, we went for a walk around town to scope out food options, as well as getting a feel for Dahab. After walking for a while, we returned to Penguin Village to lounge in the restaurant attached to the hotel. Juanita decided to head to bed around midnight; I stayed up for a while, chatting with a couple of the staff members. Around 2AM, I decided to go and lay on the deck and stargaze for a bit before heading to bed.
On Monday, I took my time getting up for the day, showered and went to find Juanita. In short, we lazed about all day. We each made plans for trips departing that night. Juanita decided to do a two day whirlwind tour of Jerusalem, Bethlehem, the Dead Sea, and Petra, while I decided to go on the night hike to Mount Sinai to watch the sunrise in the morning. Juanita left around 9PM, and at 11PM, my bus was ready to depart. The bus drove around several hotels in town, picking up 12 people in total, and then driving to the foot of Mt. Sinai. At 2:20AM, we began our walk, which seemed endless. In the dark, you can see the summit looming in front of you, and you think, you hope that it’s not as far as it looks. It took our group three hours and twenty minutes to reach the summit. The walk up was exhausting but incredible. The night sky was as clear as I’ve ever seen it, and I saw quite a few meteors. At about 5:40, we reached the summit, and before long, the first signs of sunrise were apparent. The sky became redder and redder, and the sun rose over the peaks before us. It was beautiful… and absolutely freezing; I had to rent a blanket to keep warm. At 7, we began our descent in full daylight, and luckily, once the sun rose, the temperature was quite pleasant. We made it down Mt. Sinai in an hour and a half, and then waited for half an hour outside of St. Katherine’s Monastery, waiting for it to open at 9. The doors open, and in we all filed. The church itself was beautiful, and inside the monastery walls is where the alleged descendant of the burning bush grows. We left wishes in the spaces between the bricks that surround the burning bush ancestor, and then made our way to the entrance to catch our ride back home. We arrived at Penguin Village around noon, and I promptly fell asleep for five hours. When I woke, I didn’t do much of anything, and hung around the restaurant for the remainder of the night.
On Wednesday, I woke and though I had considered spending the day diving, as I had suspected might be the case, I was far too tired to do any such thing. I was lazy for the majority of the day, though I did take a walk around the center of town, and did some shopping for my little sister’s upcoming birthday. That night, Juanita returned home from her journey, and we celebrated this fact with food and beer.
Thursday was to be my last full day in Dahab, and I told myself that I was going to go diving. I woke early in the morning to make the 9AM dive, and woke to feelings of extreme anxiety due to worries about a few skills that I was to perform my for refresher dive, which is necessary for anyone who hasn’t been diving within the past six months. My anxiety got the better of me, and I told them that I was going to skip the 9AM dive, and instead catch the 1Pm dive, so that I had more time to rest and talk myself out of my worries. At 12:30, I started getting worried again, and came very close to deciding to miss the 1PM dive as well, but I was calmed down by a friendly girl who had also just had to do a refresher dive. The girl’s name was Saäna, and she was from Finland.
Once in the water, I was elated that I had decided to go through with the dive, and enjoyed the whole thing thoroughly. After I was done with the refresher part of the dive, and had completed the skills, we went diving, and reached a depth of about 20 meters, or 66 ft, which is the deepest dive I’ve done so far. The reef was magnificent, and I saw so many incredible types of fish! I saw trumpet fish, dragon fish, scorpion fish, clown fish, among those that I can actually name. It was a remarkable experience, and once done, I wished dearly that I hadn’t been so foolish and worried that morning… but so it goes! Once back from the dive, I hung out with Juanita for a while, and later went to pick up the present which I had ordered a day before. Afterwards, I returned to the Penguin restaurant, and spent more time with Saäna and Juanita. Saäna lives in Helsinki, and when I mentioned that I was planning on going in March, she offered me a place to stay. I told her that I would be sure to take her up on her offer, as I had been intending on Couch Surfing while there anyway, and then discovered that she is a Couch Surfer as well! Viva CS! The rest of the night was spent sitting around the fire, drinking beers and chatting with the staff… and excellent and relaxing last night in Dahab, truly reflective of the duration of my stay there.
I woke early on Friday, in order to ready my things for the journey to Nuweiba, and then onto Jordan. Juanita and I ate breakfast, and said a fond farewell… well, more like a ’see you later,’ as I now have a place to stay in New Zealand. Warning: Offer me a place to stay, and I will take you up on it. I need only the smallest excuse to travel.
The bus trip to Nuweiba was uneventful, and after about an hour, I found myself at the port ferry ticket office, which proved to be an adventure in itself. While there, I met two guys: Nathan, from Chicago, and Feargus, from Ireland. We chatted for the duration of our long camp out at the ticket office. I arrived around noon, and the ferry was due to leave at 3PM. The ticket office didn’t open until 1:30, and I didn’t have my ticket in hand until 2:50… welcome to ‘Egyptian time.’ It was 3:50 by the time that we were on the ferry, and 4:40 by the time it left port… truly ridiculous!
The ferry ride was fairly quiet. We gave our passports to the officials so that we could pick them up at the office in Jordan, complete with Jordanian visa. During the ride, one of the crew took a liking to me, and later called the three of us up to first class, where a full band was playing an impromptu concert. After a few hours, we were docked in Aqaba, Jordan… and that is the start of another story.

First signs of sunrise as seen from the summit of Mount Sinai

Getting lighter…

And this is what we had been surrounded by in our dark walk to the top

The crowds, all taking photos of the rising sun

The chapel at the Mount Sinai summit that some madman was crazy enough to build!

More crowds…

The sun has risen, and at this point, people started descending

It was FREEZING at the top!

Breathtaking, non?

The walk down

The morning views were spectacular

Camels. As far as I’m concerned, they’re the strangest creatures on the planet.

St. Katherine’s monastery

The bush allegedly descended from the burning bush

The wishing wall!

Back down at the bottom; I made it!

Ooph… enough pictures from Mount Sinai?

The Gulf of Aqaba, directly outside of the restaurant.

The land you can see in the distance? Oh, that’s just Saudi Arabia.

Dahab by night

A picture of me and the lovely Juanita, with whom I spent basically all of my time in Dahab.

This is the restaurant attached to the hotel… so, where I spent the majority of my time just lazing around. It was glorious.

Bye bye Egypt! This was taken from the ferry on the way to Jordan.

Jordan up next! Complete with SO MANY PHOTOS!