With a few minutes to spare, I figured now would be a good time to check in and let any blog followers know that I did in fact arrive alive.
This past Saturday night, I boarded a plane in Montreal at 5 PM. By 11 PM Montreal time, I was landing in Charles de Gaulle, meaning 5 AM Paris time. I then had a fairly uneventful 5 hour layover (highlighted by a demo PS3 station), leaving Paris at 10:00 AM local time, or 4 in the morning for my internal clock. Of course, as of this wasn't enough, after boarding, they made us sit in the plane on the ground for 45 minutes before finally taking off for Tel Aviv, and touching down at around 4:45 PM local time, or 9:45 AM Montreal time. How's that for messing a person up?
Yet, strangely, my body has adapted quite well, and I've been busy out here ever since. That very night was filled with meeting people, dinner, orientation/intro sessions, and an evening stroll along the Tel Aviv beach.
The next day was Holocaust Remembrance and Heroism here in Israel, so we attended a ceremony at a local high school... which would have been really interesting if either 1) I spoke Hebrew, or 2) Any of it was in English. But still, it was good to be here for it I s'pose.
We next left for the north of Israel where we had a short hike around Mount Carmel (no, this is not where caramel is made... yeah, I know, I was disappointed too...) before pulling into the kibbutz where we enjoyed dinner and spent the night just chillin'.
The following day was an early wake-up for a 4 hour hike... yes, that's right, 4 hour hike... through the Golan Heights. And it wasn't just your typical 4 hour hike either. After starting off with a beautiful waterfall, we were told there would be an uphill (which was essentially climbing up a steep rock path) and then... all downhill from there.
What they DIDN'T tell us was that the downhill was going to be an extremely narrow path, much of which was leaping from stone to stone through streams and mud, with barbed wire protecting us from potential mine fields on one side, and prickly thorny plants jabbing at us from the other. Oh and of course low thick branches overhead that for relatively tall people like myself, can get quite annoying. BUT at least it wasn't ridiculously hot out (you know, like, only mid-20s Celsius), and it was actually a really fun time.
After the hike, we drove up another part of the mountains back to the same spot I had previously visited on Birthright in order to look down the hill at Syria. Our tour guide told us stories of the wars that won and preserved the Golan for Israel, and then it was off to begin our long drive south towards Eilat. The drive would first include a stop for ice cream at an awesome place with all kinds of crazy flavours. My selection was a chocolate Nutella-flavored frozen treat which tasted just like its spreadable namesake.
Next it was a stop at a kibbutz somewhere near the Dead Sea for dinner and sleep... well not much sleep in actuality, since the kibbutz bar got going, meaning a third late night in a row to kick off this fataberific 5 month adventure. On that note, let me just say that Israeli men are extremely direct and aggressive when it comes to women... even moreso than the French boys I got to witness in Rouen and Paris. Actually, even moreso than the cross-dressing (and/or trans-sexual) prostitutes on the streets of France. So if you are reading this and are a young female planning to come out here, please do be careful with that.
The following day was finally our arrival in Eilat, but I'll have to save the description of that for next time!
There is one piece of bad news which has me very bummed... my brand new camera that was a very generous going away / early Birthday gift from some very sweet folks is already broken. :( The inside of the LCD was smashed when I went to take it out of the case one morning. Sooo I will be mostly picture-less for a little while until I get a new one, as apparently fixing it won't be an option here.
But DON'T FRET!!! I promise more pics will eventually come along with more news from what I promise has turned out to be an absolutely beautiful city!
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