A Series Of Stupid Decisions

The international school had their first organized tiyul of the semester, two days hiking through the central Negev. We left Haifa at 6:30 on Friday morning and headed for Be'er Sheva. I dozed until about Netanya and then woke up again for good and listened to my mp3 the rest of the way. We got to Be'er Sheva at about 9 in the morning and waded into the Druze market on the southern edge of the city to get some breakfast. While there, Nate and Elan bought keffiyahs. I had brought the one I bought in Cairo (I got it expressly for hiking purposes) and once on the bus, Nate and I started playing around with them. One of our staffers, Oshrat was walking back counting heads when she came to our seat and did a double take. Can't say I blame her.

This photo was taken in Beirut in 1977

Our destination on Friday was the Small Machtesh, a large erosion crater of which there are several in the Negev and the Sinai Peninsula, and nowhere else on earth. In fact, the Hebrew word machtesh is the scientific term describing the phenomena. Thats pretty cool, says this observer.

Looking out across the machtesh.

We climbed down a steep, sheer cliff face into the crater. It was slow going to keep anyone from meeting their maker as a fleshy smear at the bottom of the machtesh. This was the kind of steep that would have given my mother a heart attack just being near the edge. Me, I loved it. Everyone was still nice and energized because we hadn't been out in the heat for that long, so we kept a lively chatter all the way down to the bottom. Once the ground leveled out, we picked up the pace and hiked for another half hour before pulling off the trail into a wadi to find some shade for lunch. We found a nice little overhang out of the sun where everyone piled in and munched.

Lunch was a subdued affair. Everyone was just passing around whatever they brought to eat and talking about movies. Our tour guide told a couple of racy jokes before we get moving. This one sticks out in my mind: Why are camels called the "ships of the desert?"
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"Because they are filled with Bedouin semen."
Fantastic. We rolled out after an hour or so. The terrain was a lot easier in the machtesh, which was more or less flat. Along the way I found a great walking stick that I kept with me for the rest of the day. We stopped briefly at the "colored sands" of marginal fame, before winding our way out of the machtesh and towards the waiting tour bus.

Lea and I on a rust colored sand dune.

I dozed off on the bus with an hour's distance to get to our camp site for the evening. When I came to, it was dusk and we were pulled off to the side of the road: Our bus had broken down! Always what you want when your on a back country road in the middle of the Negev. The driver was outside throwing buckets of cool water on the engine. I was talking to Eli on the phone about our weekend plans when the engine roared to life again, and we began to crawl forward. I was not in the mood to get out and push anyway. That night we stayed in the eternally cliche "Bedouin tent" again. We had a nice kabbalat shabbat program in the tent, with singing and a few Jewish morality themed stories. We made a feast as usual, with tons of meat, several different kinds of salad, fresh tehina and pita that we made ourselves over the campfire. Afterwards we roasted marshmallows for s'mores, and then a group of people climbed up a nearby hill to look at the stars.

Standing around the campfire.

The next day we hiked through Ein Bokek, a trail that is dominated by hot springs and wadi's that had some water in them due to the recent rains. We stopped at a natural pool and my better prepared colleagues started changing into swim suits. I had forgotten mine. I lay out on a flat rock to sun myself when I heard about the second pool nearby that was small enough to wade into without actually swimming. This would prove to be the start of my downfall. I headed over with the intent of washing the sweat and grime out of my hair. I waded in about knee deep and dunked my head into the water - and the rest of me followed shortly after. Thoroughly soaked and marginally embarrassed, I climbed out, only to feel an unwelcome weight in my side pocket - I reached in and pulled out my cell phone. It was off and wasn't turning back on. I let out a stream of curses and then took the thing apart, hoping that if it dried out it would work again.

The swimming hole.

Having already gotten all wet, I figured I may as well go swimming, so I ditched my shirt and climbed down the narrow crevice into the water. Nothing could have prepared me for this cold. My testicles were up somewhere near small intestine. I swam across to the bank on the other side to get out of the water, when I felt the second unwelcome weight, this time in my back pocket. I pulled out my waterlogged wallet and pondered it for a second, before cutting loose with a second string of F-bombs. Dejected, I lobbed the wallet up to some friends sitting on the ledge above, hoping my money and cards would later be salvageable. I waded back into the water, ready to face the chill in the hopes of at least accomplishing what I initially set out to do, and wash my hair out. I dunked my head a second time, shook it out and then came up blind: my motherfucking glasses had fallen off and disappeared into the murk! Bless my friend Colleen, she refused to let my moronic decisions doom me to a lost pair of glasses on top of everything else. She found them and pulled them out of the water for me, very much intact and no worse off.

At least I didn't do something stupid in this photo.

Our final stop on yesterday's trip was at the dead sea. I actually went in the water this time, for the first time since I was 17. It was pleasant. I only had one minor cut so there wasn't much stinging or discomfort this time around. I floated with a group of people, and then showered off and changed into dry (but not clean) clothing. I smelled like a cross between a rotten egg and a foot all the way home. The ride home was actually one of the highlights of the trip. We took the road from the dead sea to Jericho, and then traveled through the West Bank to Jerusalem. Along the way, Danny Moss busted out with his guitar and myself and four or five other guys serenaded the group for a solid 45 minutes. People were singing along, clapping and having a grand old time. After a stop for food and diesel, I headed to the back of the bus where Diana and Josh were performing slam poetry. It was a sweet ride home, and a relaxing way to close out the evening. By the way, my phone is dried out and working again, and my cards and money are all in working order as well. Mallory gave me the idea of putting all the phone parts in a bag of rice overnight, as the rice would absorb the moisture. I don't know if that's what did it, but the phone works again so I owe her one. The wallet is the only thing that wasn't salvageable, but that's not a huge deal. I can laugh about it today.