Royal Ein Bokek

... almost perfect timing, as we came around a corner the car came to a screeching halt. A pack of camels was blocking the road. Wild camels (or at least there was no immediately present person guiding them). Seriously. Awesome.<br> <br> I then fell asleep.<br> <br> The driver woke me up by shaking my shoulder about an hour later. As I began to open my eyes, I was looking out on a beautiful body of water, the Dead Sea. Since it is the ...

... Ich fahre rechts ran. Nach meinen Erwartungen hätten wir von dem Highway aus eher mal nach rechts abbiegen müssen und nicht links, wie der Soldat am Check Point sagte. Unsere Strassenkarte zeigt zwar Qurayqira an, aber keine Strasse von dort nach Petra. Während wir dahinter kommen, dass wir offensichtlich nicht mehr auf dem Kings Highway sondern auf dem Dead Sea Highway waren, hält ein weiteres Auto neben uns. Der Fahrer fragt, ob wir etwas bestimmtes suchen. Er ist halb Amerikaner ...

... br>We all slathered ourselves head to toe in mud and tanned until it dried. I then went in the water and let the salty, greasy feeling water wash it off. Suddenly I felt a stinging in my eyes and I couldn't very well touch them because my hands are in the water. The sea water had gotten into my eyes and it was very painful. I had to paddle back with my arms while floating all the way back to shore. I squinted my best to see that I was going in the right ...

... is a real tense part of the world. As I said the Dead Sea was amazing yet really freaky we floated on out (using our hands as little outboard motors) until it was deep enough that we could stand. The water is crazy we were just standing there bobbing up and down it is so hard to go under the water (not that you would want to unless you wanted to cry for 2 weeks). We were doing the running man and pretending we were cycling, it was soooo much fun!<br><br>After ...

We started off Saturday morning by heading back down to the Dead Sea area. Once we got down the hill, we drove along the western bank of the Dead Sea. It's amazing just how desolate that area is - not a single animal or plant can live in or around there. The Dead Sea is about 33% salt, versus 2-3% in the ocean. More on that later. We passed En Gedi (where David hid from Saul in the caves - he also wrote some of the Psalms there ...

... every nook and cranny of the Old City is rediculus.  It's beautiful but polluted by the commercialism of it all.  Too much junk for sale on beautiful, ancient streets.  I think tomorrow I'm going to look for an apartment to live in, but not sure if I'll find much since Shabbat is tomorrow at sunset and no work can be done.  Not even pressing a button in an elevator for the intended floor.  They leave elevators running all day stopping at every floor and ...

... predominately Muslim countries (and we hear Egpyt are slaughtering all their pigs right now, though none have tested positive for the swine flu). We ended up becoming regulars at this place while in Madaba, sampling fresh juices, turkish coffees and even watching a soccer match between Egypt and South Africa with several locals on our last night. We will be driving the rental car back into Amman, the capital city, where we stay for three nights before flying to Istanbul.

... Amman and Aqaba. We were first approached by a man and then realize he is a taxi driver. He will take us to Karak with a stop in Shobak to see the crusader castle there and a stop in Dana a wildlife reserve - we were told it doesn't have anything really to see there. All this for 60 JD! So the negotiations begin and we also say we will go to Amman and catch the next bus back to Karak - we only have lots of time. We debate what we will do and get him ...

... Because of the serious need for water in this part of the world, the Dead Sea level has noticeably lowered, and has separated into an upper, deep section, and a lower shallow section which is mostly evaporation pools used to extract the minerals from the water. Normal ocean water is about 6 percent salt, the water of the Dead Sea is 1/3 minerals, many of which have commercial value. Water is now pumped from the upper part of the Sea through canals, over land, to the ...

To continue catching up, my program took about 150 of the participants for a trip to the south of Israel a few weeks ago. We went in groups on hikes during the day and stayed at a hotel right off of the Dead Sea. We started with a hike in HaMaktesh HaGadol (the Big Crater) which had great views of the Negev Desert and bright colored sand in certain areas. We spent the night at the hotel; my friends and I hung ...