Road Trip: Dead Sea

As we left Jerusalem and the setting sun behind us we headed down the mountains into an alien world.  There were street lamps along the highway enough to briefly show us the Sea Level sign as we whizzed past, still dropping like a stone.  In the distance orange street lights crawled up a black mountain but as those went into Jordan, we had to turn away and go south into the unlit desert.  We found our turn off just south of Qumran where the Dead Sea scrolls had been discovered.  Due to the lack of available cheap hotel rooms in En Gedi and a general sense of crazy adventure, I had selected a simple room in Metzoke Dragot at the top of a cliff at ~1000ft above the Dead Sea.  Kenny drove the twisting switchbacking road in the dark while I diligently watched for the camels that the road signs warned us could be dangerously close (think deer warnings in the US).  We arrived at the top of the cliff in front of a yellow gated compound in the middle of a gale.  The wind was howling.  A note fluttering on the gate told me to call Lilian to open the gate.  Fortunately I had a local cell phone that got 2 bars of coverage if I held it right.  The call went through and minutes later the gate rumbled open.

We ate camp-style bbq chicken with assorted salads, potatoes and pitas that tasted like good bbq should.  Unfortunately we had also stumbled upon a camp outing for five tour buses full of pre-teen Israeli school children.  They slept in the goat hair tents just behind our cabins.  The beds were very hard but the shelter was good and we eventually fell asleep.

The morning allowed us to finally get our bearings.  The scenery was breathtaking.  Storm clouds darkened the sea and the eastern mountains while tiny rays of light filtered down like heaven's graces upon the water.  The Judean desert sparkled in the early morning sun.

This good light was fleeting and by the time we got ready to hike, our sun had moved far to the west.  We wandered along well-marked hiking/jeep trails and got a very good look into Wadi Dagura, a deep dry riverbed canyon, which we were told by several people could be deadly on days like today when the flash floods could arrive.



We finished hiking the cold, empty desert and decided it was time for a Dead Sea float.  We went to Mineral Beach because it was cold outside and they have a hot-spring fed hot tub.  I really enjoyed floating in the extra-salty water.  It was a very strange sensation.  You had to stay on your back the whole time because if you leaned forward, the water was likely to tip you onto your face!  It was a cross between water and gelatin.  Kenny called it "sludge."

After the float, we washed up, toweled off and drove to Masada.  Masada is the remains (very well preserved) of Herod's palaces where ~1000 Jewish revolutionaries held out against a Roman legion for years.  The story goes that when it was clear that the Romans were going to win the siege the Jews in Masada chose a free death over slavery and committed mass suicide rather than be taken prisoner.  Such is the mystique of Masada that the Israeli Defense Forces hold their swearing in ceremony there and declare "Masada shall never fall again!"

We had a tour-de-force since they close the park at 4:00 and it was 3:00 by the time we got up to the summit.  Because of the lack of time we took the gondola up and hiked the Snake Path back down.  We made it out to the three sections of the Northern Palace, perched on a the edge of the cliff.  That was the most exciting ruin I have ever visited.  Here are some pictures:

Descending to the Northern Palace

Northern Palace from the bottom

The storerooms

The national park workers shooed us out the gate at 3:55 and we took a nice leisurely walk back down.  By the time we reached the bottom at 4:45 the visitor's center was completely deserted.  We walked around the building several times before concluding that the only way we were going to get to our car in the underground car park was to walk through the garage.  I half expected to see a gate over the front since a sign had said "closes at 4:00," but fortunately it was open and we drove out without hassle.

We took the southern route past Mt. Sodom and the pillar of rock that's called Lot's wife.  It was clear in the west but stormy in the east, creating some amazing weather, including a rainbow.  Veronica snapped a shot of it from the backseat as we drove and finally I got a picture at sunset just before it disappeared.  Gorgeous!

Zach fired up "Enter Sandman" on the ipod and we drove through the rain and the night to our next stop deep in the Negev desert--Mitspe Ramon, which means "Ramon watchtower."