To the Bottom of the Earth

Last weekend (before the work retreat and the Palestinian fashion show) we embarked upon a journey to the bottom of the Earth!  We didn't go alone, we took our friends with us :)

On Friday night we packed up our backpacks with all of the essential camping gear (tent, sleep bags, water purifier, headlamps) and the lightest food possible (couscous, granola, peppers, and lots and lots of water).  I consider these trips to be like a workout boot camp - we hike up, we climb down, we carry 30lb bags, then we eat just veggies and whole grains, and not very much of them because they are too heavy to carry all that way.  Is the best weight loss plan I can think of because you really have to choose between the chocolate bar and a clean pair of underwear.

We parked our car on the side of the road in the middle of the desert and headed up the first hill (pictured above) and got our first view of the Dead Sea, our destination just 6.2 miles away...on the other side of the desert.  I'll admit that I have a slight fear of heights and the first climb down took me much longer than the rest of the group. 

The area around the Dead Sea is...well...dead.  We only saw a few flowers (which smelled great!) and one or two small green oasises where water once collected.  It was beautiful to go up and down and in between massive rocks and cliffs, noticing the change in the color or the shape as we went along. 



Waterfall below. This is where the two trails "cross."



Israelis are really into hiking (but not camping) so they have books and webpages devoted to marking trails.  These are mostly in Hebrew so they are useless to us.  But there is one good site in English.  The trail guides generally haven't been updated in a few years so the first "waterfall" was dry this time and last time the "river" was really a dried up rock bed.  There are also cultural differences such as the time when "family friendly" included a 10 foot climb up a rock face.  For the most part this guide was good - but the trail itself was like walking through the desert...it was walking through the desert.  Every step gave you more and more desert. This trail guide said at a certain point two paths crossed.  My plan was to take the easy path and avoid the "400 meter steep slope down" which would be "difficult."  Well, the paths crossed, but we were at least 20 stories above the easy path with no other way down than the "steep slope." 

I was a little slow and shaky, but when we finally reached the bottom we found the waterfall and stream with plenty of time to set up camp, collect fire wood and start on a delicious dinner.  In the morning we followed the stream to the Dead Sea.  Our friends headed back to Tel Aviv and Paul and I headed to the beach for our first dip in the Dead Sea (more on this later).  After a swim we showered off and as the sun was setting we headed North in search of another camp site.  Though I usually plan FAR in advance, I had no clue where we were going (hopefully not too far or it would be dark and we would end up in the West Bank).  "What was that? Is that a trail?  Will you see if I can pull the car off the road there?" 

We pulled a U-ey and carefully exited the road onto the sandy/rocky ground.  As soon as our car was a safe distance from the traffic we grabbed our gear, threw on our head lamps and headed up the mountain/cliff.  The sign at the trail head said "no diving" so we figured there must be water - which would mean life and thus firewood....and hopefully some flat ground so we didn't sleep on pointy rocks! 

On the way up we saw our first Ibex!  Actually our first three!  The family was very suspicious of us and we didn't have time to grab the camera, the sun was setting and we had no clue where we were going or what we would find on top.  Lucky for us, when we hit the plateau there it was:  a beautiful green oasis with one live tree and one dead tree!  The ground was comparably soft with no rocks and best of all - we had an amazing view of the sunrise in the morning!  We got sooo lucky! We had enough firewood for 4 hours, there were no lights around so we could see the most beautiful starry night, and because it was the desert we didn't have to worry about wild boars or vultures.  The downside to this camping spot was that - as a green oasis it is the feeding ground for the Ibex....and the ibex....use the restroom where ever they are.  Long story short:  we smelled pretty ripe in the morning when we arrived at our work retreat!



Sunrise Over the Dead Sea - from our tent.



Jen's First Sandstorm

"It's a bad one out there," says an elder colleague as he exits the office. "What?" replies Jen, confused at the thought of less than perfect weather in Tel Aviv. "The sandstorm, it's a bad one," he clarifies. Jen runs to the window to see a haze over the city. It's the end of the world!!

Khamsin (with the harsh "H" at the beginning) is a sandstorm produces when winds kick up the sand in Africa (Egypt) and blow them towards the Mediterranean Sea. The sand is then carried thousands of miles until it blows West onto the shores where we found it in Tel Aviv this week.

Because my image of a sandstorm prior to this was either a.) winds blowing sand into your face in the desert or b.) my brother throwing sand at me, I'll explain what it was like: The sky was a yellowish-gray color like something from a movie about the apocalypse, the beach was deserted and few people were outside. (I purposely did not play with the colors or blur on the photo so you could see exactly what it looked like. This is well before sunset. The buildings are .5 miles away)

When you walked outside you were greeted by the finest mist of sand almost unnoticeable except for the grind you start to feel in your teeth and the sand collecting in your shoes. (Think of magic ferry dust.) The sand was most noticeable on the cars which looked like they had just passed under a bridge and sand/cement splatter on them. Before we could pull out of our parking spot we had to turn on the windshield wipers - but instead of water dripping off, the sand was pushed aside. At home our "garden" plants were doing better than we'd expected, but the balcony floor had a light coating of sand.

The temperature was the same and you didn't feel or hear the sand falling, but the eerie color of the sky, the grit in your mouth and the light covering of sand on everything really looked like the end of the world. But don't worry- it is sunny with a high of 75 today. I think we'll be okay.

Cat Woman

When I was little I loved Cat Woman so much that I had my mom make me a Cat Woman costume for Halloween - long black fingernails and all. Today, I hate Cat Woman. More so, I hate the cat woman who feeds the cats in my alley. I guess they would literally be alley cats.

Cats are a phenomena here. They are all over! We were warned: don't touch the stray cats! They may look cute but they may also have some disease and attack you. Emphasis on the attack part. THESE ARE NOT HOUSE CATS PEOPLE! Would you pet a rat in the alley?!
I pretty much see them as filthy scavengers just one (or two) step(s) above mice - which thank God we don't have thanks to these cats. For the most part they are out of the way - in the trash can, sitting under a bench or on top of a car. They don't usually cause any problems (except leaving paw prints and scattering trash); But none the less, they are ugly and the thought of them attacking me is kind of scary.

So why does this make me hate Cat Woman? She is akin to the woman in Mary Poppins who feeds the pigeons. (Feed the birds...toppins a bag...) Here's how it goes...every day!:

apx 6:30pm - Feeds about 10 cats at the North end of the alley.
apx 6:40pm - Walks down alley with used grocery bag of consumables, followed in toe by 4 cats.
apx 6:45pm - Feeds about 8 cats at the South end of the alley.
apx 6:50pm - Leaves the alley.

SHE DEOSN'T EVEN LIVE THERE! This crazy woman is feeding all of the stray cats right by my house and then she goes home to her own neighborhood (which I'm guessing is a few blocks away and full of cats) and leaves my alley full of mangy ugly alley cats!!! Feed your own cats woman!! I don't want them to stick around my place!

This wouldn't bother me so much if I only had to look at them - but yesterday I finally gave up my dream of washing my own car and paid to have the sea salt and cat prints washed off. I even went so far as to have the car waxed! It looks beautiful! Until 30 minutes later...the cat lady came...and her cats pranced all over my clean car. It was as if she'd put the food on my sunroof and under my tires. (Sigh...) Any suggestions?

(Those are cat prints on top of my car!)

Oh, my poor car!

The light turns green…verrrmmmmmm…buh buh buuuuh. We jerk forward, jump 2 or 3 times, and stop. “It’s okay. Just start the car and we’ll try again.”

Verrrmmmmmmmmmm…buh buh buuuh. (Sigh…count to three.) “Okay, maybe a little less gas this time, and let off the clutch slowly.” Verrrmmmmm…buuuuh. (Oh, my poor car!)

The first driving lesson went VERY well! We woke up at 630am on Saturday morning, and because it is shabbot the religious can’t work – and driving a car is work. Luckily we aren’t that kind of religious so it was the perfect time for us to work on learning how to drive our new manual car. After three rounds of explanation on how to start the car, how to start moving forward and how to shift into second gear Paul repeated the directions back to Jen and they were off. Perfect start! You would have though Paul had been driving stick for years! Honestly.

We went one block, hit traffic and Jen drove back to a quiet street. The second start was a little rougher, but after just one stall we were moving! Paul gracefully stopped and started at the stoplight, turning left onto the four-lane road to Hertzalia (the suburbs to the north) and making it into 4th gear successfully. Paul was doing a great job…until the stop light. We sat through four reds, or more so, we didn’t make it through four reds. Verrmmmmm…buh buh buuuuh. I was starting to think this might be enough damage to the car for one day when someone knocked on the window…with a badge! Oh no!!! I don’t speak Hebrew well enough to talk my way out of a ticket! Is this illegal?!?!

“Roving patrol, is everything okay?.” (Roving patrol is like our own personal security, not Israeli. Their job is to protect us as opposed to society at large. We’ve had a few embarrassing encounters like this one where they think we need to be saved from some danger like us blowing our own fuses while cooking dinner.) Anyway, roving patrol was passing by and noticed us stopped in the middle of the road, sitting through 4 green lights and just wanted to make sure we weren’t having car problems. Nope…just learning how to drive. Thanks!

We made it through the light on the next try, drove through downtown Hertzalia, stopped at a red light on a hill with traffic, went around a circle and headed back home. The hour-long lesson was much more successful than expected and as a result we were out driving for about an hour! At this rate, Paul will be driving us to work very soon! US. Yes, US to work. Jen started work on Monday!!!

(We found out two days later that you have to have a special license to drive stick here! We are pretty sure that we are good on that though until we get the Isreali/international driver's licenses...we hope.)