Hanukkah - Part 2: Aquariums and Canyon Hikes

The next day in Eilat dawned bright, but had a chill in the air....I feel foolhearted saying that since I'm a born and bred Vermonter, who's survived many a bitter winter. But keep in mind, that I've been in the country for almost four months now, in a place that sits along the same fault line as the Great Rift Valley and gets some of its weather from Jordan and Syria. So in the past couple of months my blood has thinned and my cold resistance tolerance has plummeted. [This will be an important detail to keep in mind for later in this tale!]

The weather had a bit of a brisker quality about it, but we were still on the beaches of the Red Sea where the coral reefs are legendary and dolphins leap playful to the cheers of tourists and their children...all for the right price, of course.  Let's not forget, it's Eilat - a paradisaical dream with illusions of Vegas grandeur and Atlantic City prosperity, only to be tempered by a proclivity towards conservatism, not suited for gambling, fast women and binge drinking, so it abates itself with duty free shops. 

Little Dory fish swimming through her reef-y world

First stop for Jessica, Joe and I was to the Underwater Observatory Marine Park, a park and aquarium which features shark feedings, a glass tunnel completely made of glass for 360 degrees of exotic fish viewing and the ability to take selfies with stingrays as well as an underwater observing station so one can see the colors of the Red Sea coral reefs from 42 meters (137.8 ft) under the waves. 

Aforementioned selfie with stingray

Photo op from the top of the observatory, with Jordan mountains in the background

Afterwards, the three of us made a quick stop at a grocery store - after the previous night's disastrous subsistence (primarily for everyone but Joe) we were trying to take precautions of being savvy on our wallets as well as our bellies. So we swung by a grocery store and grabbed what I would call a college kid's worst nightmare of pittance - my haul included yogurts, a can of chickpeas and what I imagined must be a frozen meal of vegetables and couscous since that's what the delicious looking picture on the box depicted! (Foreshadowing). 

We stopped by the Airbnb villa, ate our pitiful lunch, from which I can report that eating a can of chickpeas is just as pathetic as it sounds, and headed back out, this time driving away from Eilat and along the Egypt border.  We were so close to the Egyptian border that the road took us right along the heavily fortified fence,so we could see views of the desolate Sinai Desert.

Jessica at the wheel, with the Egyptian border on the left.

A must have fashion accessory: the fanny pack

Our destination was a hike called Red Canyon, which I had found out about from some stunning picture from National Geographic, as well as the reputable source of Trip Adviser. The latest review of the hike said that the hike was posted as closed due to water damage, but to ignore that warning and hike on - it wasn't that damaged & the hike was negatable. On the way down some dirt and rock roads not meant to be traverse by Nissan Micra, we passed other tourists being turned around and a sort of park ranger who told us the trail was closed. But I held onto the words of Trip Adviser to ignore all of this and press on - not easy to convince my group of, but they did it! When we reached the lower parking lot and got out to take a look around, we saw people coming up the trail! Lots of people, actually - everyone from a stoner teenage kid to a mom originally from Canada with her three kids! I insisted that if they could do it, so could we, so I coerced my intrepid group to press on for views that would be worth it! 

Well, big thank you to the dauntless reviewers at Trip Adviser - they were not wrong. We maneuvered across some challenging descents by rung across some rock faces, but the reward was completely worth it! 

The closest thing the scalloped red rock faces of the canyon brought to mind was scenes of Tatooine from Star Wars [which still have yet to see!].

We wrapped up the hike and headed back over the mountains, the sun was slipping beneath the horizon casting showed lines across the ancient mountains.Their faces exposed colorful rock layers of black and red that had bore witness to thousands of years of history, different empires, religions and leaders.  It was a moment of profound awareness of how small of an entity I was, but also the kismet of being able to tread this are at this place and time.  

Naturally, we were all really hungry after the hike, so when we returned to the villa,Joe, Jessica and I got busy making our supermarket bought meals. Joe had a pizza of questionable taste (Israel is not a nation known for it's pizza making prowess) and Jess and I had the alleged frozen couscous meal, which I imagined was like the Annie's meals I knew and loved back home!  

Unfortunately, high expectations are never a good thing to have in Israel - the meal turned out to be just 2+ pounds of frozen couscous in a Tupperware and that was our one meal option.  So night two in Eilat ended with us dining on a meal of couscous flavored with dry soup mix made up by the culinary mastery of Jessica.  It was one of the most hilarious concoctions I've ever eaten, but hey it worked!

New lows of gourmet were reached that night.

We went to beds tucked into our little bunk beds, woke up the next morning and grabbed our bags to catch the van that would take us to the Jordanian border crossing.