The drive over to Sinai took about 10 hours by a big tour bus they rented just for o
ur program. When Flagship plans these incredibly awesome little excursions for us, they hire a travel group to do a lot of the planning and working out of details of the trip. This means, of course, that we're back in the big group bureacratic mentality, that sometimes can cause unpleasant situations. Such as stopping at an unnecessary rest stop on the way to Cairo that included a small zoo, and approximately 324029384701234 flies, which all promptly jumped on board our bus. Awesome. Literally the next 5 hours or so were spent swatting. At least it gave us something to do. Many were racking up epic kills in the double digits. After all the flies were gone we stopped to watch the sunset in the desert, which was really gorgeous.We finally arrived in St. Catherine (a little north of Sharm, in the mountains) at around 12:30 am, and were sent off to our cool little cabin rooms to rest up for a little while. At 2 am, we got back on the bus (AHGHHH), and drove to the base of Mt. Sinai; yes, the biblical site of the burning bush and Mose
s' trek to receive the 10 Commandments from God. Then we began our climb. The monks that have lived at the base of the mountain since the 6th century built 3,750 stone stairs all the way up the mountain so that they could to the chapel at the top to ring the bell every single day. Our Bedouin guide led us up the "easy" (er) way, winding up rocky mountain trails, dodging camels and camel poop...and ascending the final 750 Steps of Repentence. We hiked for several hours up mountain, under the most beautiful sky of stars that I've ever seen. There was so little light pollution that we walked just using the light of the moon and stars, and we could even see our shadows in the brightness of the moonlight.In the last hours of the trek, a few other guys and I ended up ahead of the larger group because of its frequent stops. The path was easy to find, so we just kept climbing. Walking up the huge stone stairs to the summit in silence was so peaceful...the only thing that reminded me that civilization still existed was the occasional plane that we could see moving
aross the dark sky. When we reached the top at around 5am, we pulled out blankets and jackets and cuddled up on the summit to watch the sky slowly lighten, as the sun rose over the mountains. Graaaand.After another couple hours of climbing back down the mountain, I had some tasty breakfast and a shower, then visited St. Catherine's Monastery, which dates back to the 6th century. The monastery was built on the site where Moses spoke to God in the burning bush, so we got to see the bush that supposedly is still growing from the original roots. It was really neat to see this still-operating monastery in the mountains, with its food-producing gardens, and a mosque and Greek Orthodox church just a few yards apart. Good evidence of the possibility of cooperation and peaceful cohabitation between religions: these guys have been living together within the same walls for almost 1500 years.
Another few-hour bus ride later, we reached Sharm el-Sheikh, which is a schmancy resort town at the southern tip of the Sinai peninsula. We checked into our gorgeous hotel and bounced on our wonderfully soft fluffy beds, looking longingly at our pillows, but sleep was not yet on the agenda. We arrived with just enough time to change into our bathing suits and hop on a glass boat ride, which was very cool! We caught a glimpse of the Saudi Arabian coastline, and were considering jumping overboard to swim over and back, just to say we had, but decided that being thrown in Saudi prison was pretty low on our priority list. On the boat ride we got to look down through the bottom of the boat, and then jump off and swim for a while with the fishes! Seeing the multi-colored fish and awesome underwater coral cities was less foreign to us, however, than walking around in Sharm and seeing LEGS again. Not only legs, but bikinis, high heels, short skirts, and ponytails not hidden by hijabs. It was culture shock all over again. I'm still doubtful that we were actually in Egypt.
Later, the most incredible night of sleep, after hanging out and watching the colorful nightlife from our balconies. The next morning we were up again, and after some confusion a
nd little to no explanation, we realized we were going snorkeling! We set off on a sweet little double decker boat called the Wassila (we had to know the name in case we got lost in the water, since there are about a hundred other boats that look exactly like it). The weather was perfect (as usual), and it was amaaaazing to just hang out on the boat in the sun and breeze. We made three stops to snorkel throughout the day, each one more incredible than the one before it. The Red Sea is home some of the best coral reefs in the world, and mannnnnn was it cool!!!!!! I got to swim with lion fish, baracuda, and we even saw a speedy blue spotted stingray. The coral and the fish were so much fun to watch, they're all like a whole little colorful city. Monica and I were swimming along at one point, and were watching a huge technicolored parrot fish swimming in and out of some coral caves, when it took a chomp out of a piece of coral. Apparently this coral was pretty crunchy, because we definitely heard it take the bite!
After an entire day out on and in the water, we were all exhausted and sunburned (despite reapplying every half hour, mom), so after a touristy and kind of disappointing evening with the "Bedouins" we took another night to sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeep before our long ride back to Alexandria the next morning.
PHEW, amaaaazing weekend. Some of the most incredible experiences and sights of my life. It just makes me think: all those hours of struggling through the craziness of Arabic grammar? Totally worth it. Thanks US government!!
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