Day 35: Dahab
So tired... but feeling great!
So last night, we took a shuttle with Kierra and some others at 11pm to St. Catherine and Mt. Sinai. Just like on the bus from Cairo to Dahab, we were stopped over and over for security checks so our sleep was pretty broken.
We arrived after 1am, and started our climb. We had forgotten our flashlight, flashlights were "expensive" (25LE or 4$) to buy there, a friend had said we didn't need a flashlight, and the moon had been bright the previous few days so we figured we didn't need it. We were wrong. It was really really dark. Unlike the rest of the sites in Egypt, Mt. Sinai is in the middle of nowhere and there is no light to be found but for the stars in the sky.
The dark was constantly broken by the flashlights of tour groups so our night vision couldn't really adjust, so we ended up just following them. Several hundred along the path, there was another cafeteria so we bought a flashlight and headed up ahead of the tour group. We tried again to go without a light and this time our eyes could adjust and we walked up without the flashlight for the rest of the way. The walk was incredible and took about 2h 15min.
Sunrise was such a spectacular view... so moving. We all really loved it.
We took the 3000 stairs of penitence (or whatever they're called,) which sucked but did get us down quite a bit faster, say 1h 30 or so. We checked out the famous monastary (that we've never heard of) and it was okay then took the bus back. The desert was so beautiful... really reminded me of California and Arizona just on a much larger scale. It was way cool.
We were wrecked but I needed to snorkel. We snorkeled at the Lighthouse and it was great. We saw lionfish, jellyfish, clownfish, and all kinds of good stuff. Jen was really nervous and had a few paniks but really came out strong in the end. The plan is to do the famous Blue Hole tomorrow and finally get some sleep tonight! Goodnight!
So last night, we took a shuttle with Kierra and some others at 11pm to St. Catherine and Mt. Sinai. Just like on the bus from Cairo to Dahab, we were stopped over and over for security checks so our sleep was pretty broken.
We arrived after 1am, and started our climb. We had forgotten our flashlight, flashlights were "expensive" (25LE or 4$) to buy there, a friend had said we didn't need a flashlight, and the moon had been bright the previous few days so we figured we didn't need it. We were wrong. It was really really dark. Unlike the rest of the sites in Egypt, Mt. Sinai is in the middle of nowhere and there is no light to be found but for the stars in the sky.
The dark was constantly broken by the flashlights of tour groups so our night vision couldn't really adjust, so we ended up just following them. Several hundred along the path, there was another cafeteria so we bought a flashlight and headed up ahead of the tour group. We tried again to go without a light and this time our eyes could adjust and we walked up without the flashlight for the rest of the way. The walk was incredible and took about 2h 15min.
Sunrise was such a spectacular view... so moving. We all really loved it.
We took the 3000 stairs of penitence (or whatever they're called,) which sucked but did get us down quite a bit faster, say 1h 30 or so. We checked out the famous monastary (that we've never heard of) and it was okay then took the bus back. The desert was so beautiful... really reminded me of California and Arizona just on a much larger scale. It was way cool.
We were wrecked but I needed to snorkel. We snorkeled at the Lighthouse and it was great. We saw lionfish, jellyfish, clownfish, and all kinds of good stuff. Jen was really nervous and had a few paniks but really came out strong in the end. The plan is to do the famous Blue Hole tomorrow and finally get some sleep tonight! Goodnight!
posted by Michael at 10:47 PM
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