St. Catherine Monastery

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The day trip to the St. Catharines Monastery in the Sinai region of Egypt was absolutely wonderful. We woke up early in the morning and we headed to the taba border crossing between eilat and egypt. There we ran into some problems crossing because we needed to get a reentry visa to be allowed back into egypt when we go there in a few days. At least the egyptian pound is very much so less than the US dollar unlike the Jordanian Dinar. Anyways, we met up with our guide and driver and we took off south west headed towards the monastery. Along the way we saw some remarkable sceneries and mountains located all in the heart of the desert during which our guide Ahmed told us all the stories from the Koran and Bible of the historical places we were to witness. When we arrived at the monastery I have to say I was fairly dissapointed as most of the sites were closed off to the general public such as the "burning bush chapel" and the "great library" which actually houses many antique books including the oldest bible ever printed in history. All of the stories were very interesting but I found myself being very skeptical if the places within the monastery were actually the same ones from the bible. For example, there is a bush there that is about 3500 years old and they say that it is the original burning bush. Another example was that they said that the golden calf destroyed by moses was entombed by stone. and lo and behold there on the road is a stone with an engraving of a cow in this stone and Ahmed says that it is the original golden calf that was destroyed. The sites we DID get to see however were incredible. After the visit to the monastery and a brief lunch and shop, we started to climb moses's mountain, the same mountain (supposedly) that Moses climbed to receive the 10 commandments (more skepticism). The hike was very long but good and I got to meet up with a lot of the locals from the area. There were many bedouins housed at the top of this mountain and it really put things in perspective for me how spoiled we are in canada. In canada all we have to do is turn on the tap to get water. There, they have to hike down 3750 stairs or 4 miles of trail to get water from a well. Load the water on to a donkey and hike back up the mountain. However, we arrived at the top and watched a beautiful sunset and hiked down the otherside of the mountain, back to the monastery and eventually back to Eilat. At the border, more problems which I won't get into too many details as a lot of this story has to do with a gift i got for someone but needless to say there are certain items that you really shouldn't bring across the border. When we finally arrived back home it was 2:00AM and we had hiked close to 20km that day and both Mike and myself were exhausted.

The following days we continued with our scuba course and actually completed the first section of the course and today (friday) we are only 1 day away from being certified scuba divers. Last night, the club held a BBQ party where all the instructors got loaded. but it was very eventful. I met some fellow canadians who are trying to get their dive masters and some other colourful characters. Right now, I have to head back to the scuba center and learn about the advantages of Enriched air. Until next post...

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