Weekend 3: The Dead Sea

I remember when I was young(er) reading about the natural wonders of the world in Encarta Encyclopedia ’96, and I distinctly recall the article about the Dead Sea—the Earth’s lowest point and saltiest body of water—accompanied by a photo of a beach with salt-encrusted rocks and light blue water. For my fifth grade science fair project, I submersed pieces of plastic into waters of varying salinity and showed that while they sank in the “fresh water” and the “Atlantic Ocean,” they floated in the “Dead Sea” (I got an honorable mention). Years later, this formerly far-off destination lay less than a hundred kilometers away. When Eli, whom I work with in the Maverick lab at Bar Ilan, invited me to go hiking in the mountains surrounding it, I took him up on the offer.

Early Friday morning, I met up with Eli and his friend Yehuda, along with Tamar and Daniel, two other American college students that work in the lab, and we made the two-hour drive over to Ein Gedi. Ein Gedi, as I understand it, means “Spring Gedi” and is a popular oasis along the Dead Sea’s coast. As we traveled past Jerusalem, we saw signs marking elevations—200m, 100m, 0m—we reached sea level at the top of a hill and proceeded to drive down to four hundred meters below.

At the trailhead, we met up with Shai, Konstantin, and Nadya, more friends of Eli, and started up the path. The beautiful trail took us into a canyon, along a river, and through lush greenery and clouds of butterflies. You’d be surprised by what springs up in a barren land blessed with a bit of moisture. We passed numerous waterfalls and stopped to swim at the bottom of one of them, where we enjoyed the refreshing break from the heat and sun and marveled at the novelty of swimming in fresh water in the middle of the desert.

Continuing on and drying off, we grew hungry and stopped for lunch in a cave, again seeking shelter from the relentless sun. Eli entertained us with stories about the Dead Sea region’s thousands of years of history.

The most ambitious portion of our chosen route took us to the top of a mountain behind the canyon complete with a view of the oasis and of the Dead Sea with fields of date trees along the shore.

We descended, stopped to see the remains of an ancient synagogue, and finally reached the parking lot below where everyone said goodbye and piled into cars. I stayed behind. I had yet to swim in the Sea.

Conveniently located next to the park lies the Ein Gedi Youth Hostel. I stopped in to ask about room prices; they told me it cost 113 shekels ($30) a night including breakfast. First of all, that’s way too much for a hostel; second, I didn’t want breakfast. Fortunately, information was free—they told me about a public beach down the road, and I made that my next stop.

After a ten-minute walk, I changed into my bathing suit, threw my backpack on a rock, and eagerly entered the Sea’s warm, salty water. At last, I found myself submerged in the place of childhood fascination. It was different than I had imagined.

I knew that things float better in salt water—my fifth grade science project told me that—and I had heard others’ accounts of the Dead Sea. Actually being in it, however, felt unreal. You know your body and have a profound sense of how it feels under the Earth’s gravity, and you know exactly how it sits in water. In the Dead Sea, you feel as though gravity has been lessened, and you float higher than you know you should. It’s strange at first, and then relaxing, to effortlessly drift.

It’s not all fun though. The water’s extreme salinity gives it an oily feel, and the smallest drop in an eye can temporarily decommission a person.

I emerged after floating for a while, showered, and changed into the five-dollar shorts I had bought in Jerusalem, which I noticed were developing a rip in the crotch. I pulled my shirt lower and hoped no one would notice.

As the sun sank lower in the sky, I thought about what to do next. I had read about Masada, an ancient stone fortress on a mountain overlooking the Dead Sea that was re-discovered in the 1800s. Remembering Mount Sinai from the week before, I decided that I wanted to climb it and watch the sunrise from there.

Here’s where I realized my predicament: ten miles of coastal highway lay between me and Masada, and all buses through the region had stopped due to the Sabbath. I knew I could run ten miles, but alone in the desert it is risky. Moreover, I had been warned that nighttime travel along the road came with the dangers of dark, shoulder-less turns, and more emphasized, dark-shouldered Arabs.

I bought a sandwich from the snack shop and contemplated my situation, when amidst the buzz of Hebrew and Arabic around me, I heard the familiar sounds of Spanish coming from behind. I turned and found a large family heading for the parking lot, and I walked over and asked where they were from.

They turned out to be Jews from Colombia, and they were as surprised to meet another Spanish speaker as I was. We talked for a while, and when they asked where I was headed and I told them south to Masada, they offered to give me a ride. I gratefully accepted. We actually ended up going past Masada to Ein Bokek to hang out and shop for a while. The father even bought us all ice cream (he refused to take my money) and then dropped me off at a youth hostel at the base of Masada. Before parting, he insisted that I take a picture with his fifteen-year-old daughter. What a guy.

I entered the hostel and quickly saw that the place was large, crowded, and understaffed, but had multiple workers at the desk so they wouldn’t know exactly who had gotten a room. The clock read 10PM, and I planned to begin hiking at 2:30AM to reach the top by dawn’s break around 4:30, so I did not intend to pay their inflated 130-shekel dorm bed rates. I sat in the air-conditioned lobby for a few minutes, where I noticed that the hole in my shorts was growing embarrassingly large. I headed for the bathroom.

When I first began traveling a few years ago, my dad gave me an important piece of advice: always keep some duct tape in your bag. This tip has served me countless times, and after entering the stall, I pulled a small roll out of my backpack, mended the inside of my shorts, and left with increased confidence and decreased boxer visibility.

I began exploring the hostel and met a group of three Russian-Israeli high school students with one intoxicated sixteen-year-old Moroccan kid in town for the weekend to work at some remote control airplane show (which they claimed the hostel owed its present crowdedness to). Thrilled to meet an American, they told me about how badly they wanted to come to the States and asked a barrage of questions. “Do you have cell phone full of latest American music?”

“No, my phone doesn’t play music or work overseas, and I’m quite content that way.”

“If I go to US right now, will I fit in?”

“No, your clothes are weird and you talk funny.” Alright well I gave them nicer answers than those; in fact we talked for an hour and eventually met up with the Moroccan kid’s father for whom the three Russians worked. Around midnight they offered me some leftover chicken from their dinner and realizing how hungry I was, I accepted. They brought me a plate of chicken, a plate of watermelon, a bag of pita bread, and a large bottle of water before saying goodnight and retiring to their room. In the second-floor lounge, I enjoyed my small feast, packed the pitas and water, and lay down on a couch.

I awoke at 2AM to the sound of two men drinking and laughing rowdily. Annoyed, I closed my eyes but got up shortly thereafter at my alarm’s beckoning and discovered that one of the men was the Moroccan father. I’m not quite sure how he ended up there after going to bed. I turned down the vodka he offered, thanked him again for the food, and headed downstairs.

I expected to find other tourists preparing to climb Masada at the Lonely Planet’s recommendation, but I encountered none. Even the front desk lay vacant. No wonder I didn’t get caught sleeping on a couch without paying for a room—they didn’t even have an attendant on the first floor, let alone a guard roaming the others. I refilled my water bottles in the bathroom and set off into the night.

I didn’t make it far—the front gate was locked. I could have climbed over with some effort but did not for the sake of my shorts. Luckily, a man and two boys on the other side were trying to drive in, and I informed them that nobody was at the front desk to answer their intercom calls. They had come for the remote control airplane show and had friends at the hostel; they called one of them and had him drive his truck to the gate to trigger the pressure sensor in the road. The gate slid open, they entered, and I left.

Sensing the cool air and the darkness of the desert night, I removed a windbreaker and a flashlight from my backpack and used each item appropriately. Having arrived by car after dark, I knew nothing about the area but walked around until I found what appeared to be Masada’s trailhead down the road. There was a ticket office, a turnstile, and a sign that read things like “take adequate water” and “no hiking after dark.” I walked inside to scope out the path.

My first thoughts upon entering and peering around with my flashlight: “this whole place is a construction site! There are huge rocks and piles of dirt all over the place! They really need to clean this up.” Then I remembered that I was in a desert and that I shouldn’t be expecting grass or trees.

I started slowly up the trail, making sure that I was indeed on the right path. After walking for a bit, I stopped and noticed the stillness of the night, the stars in the sky, and the huge, lonely mountains. I sat down on a bench on the side of the trail and decided to nap for an hour.

At 4:30 I opened my eyes to find that I could see slightly better, I assumed because they had adjusted to the dark. However, I looked toward the east and saw the faintest hint of blue peaking over the horizon. That was enough for me—time to start climbing.

This time I hiked without a flashlight, using it only occasionally to relocate the trail. I had been warned of Arabs and snakes, but I felt like I’d be able to see them alright (I encountered zero Arabs and one snake). As I rose higher up the mountain, I could discern the Dead Sea’s calm early-morning water in front of an orange glow and the mountains of Jordan in the distance. Eventually I heard the footsteps of another hiker far below; it’s surprising how well sound travels in a valley. The ascent went faster than I had anticipated, perhaps because of the rush of having entered the park while it was closed, maybe because the air at that low elevation contains ten percent more oxygen than the air at sea level. Either way, I reached the top, entered the walls of the ancient fortress half an hour before anyone else, and enjoyed a breakfast of pita bread on a stone tower as the sun made its appearance.

For the next three hours, I explored the vast complex of ruins and learned about Masada’s history. It’s a haunting tale that I won’t try to retell, but it’s worth reading if you have time.

Looking over the desert, I saw other ruins below and took note of how to get to them. I descended the mountain as the mid-morning sun grew hot. On the path beneath, I cut off at the appropriate place and examined the crumbled walls of unrestored, unexcavated buildings, the ground littered in ceramic pottery shards.

I left the park nonchalantly as if I had paid the entrance fee and thought about what to do next. I returned to the hostel to find the front desk staffed again and asked about the nearest beach. They told me to go back to Ein Gedi. I asked how to get there without a car, and they reminded me that I was in the middle of a desert on the Sabbath. Basically, it was hopeless.

Why didn’t I simply walk down to the nearest stretch of Dead Sea shore? There’s a good reason. The Dead Sea has the unique property today of actually shrinking. Yes, its water level grows lower each year because of over usage of the Jordan River, which feeds it. Thus, the Sea is surrounded in many places by salt flats that until recently lay underwater. It sounds cool, but the reality is that the sea floor is full of random pockets and crevices that get covered up, and people die from walking along the Dead Sea and being swallowed as solid ground gives way beneath them (Google “dead sea sinkholes”). I’m all for taking risks, but not that one. I left to figure out how to get to Ein Gedi.

A nearby parking lot contained ten tour buses, so I approached the circle of drivers and asked if any were heading north anytime soon. “No, we’re all heading south.” Sure you are. Whatever, I didn’t want to take a bus anyways.

I asked the guard at the gate what people normally do in my situation, and he said he could call a cab for me. I asked how much the sixteen-kilometer drive would cost, and he told me it’d be 130 shekels. No thanks, I didn’t plan on a $35 taxi ride.

After a long walk down to the main road, I had no trouble getting a northbound car to stop, and a guy in his late twenties was kind enough to drop me off at the public beach.

I spent the day between the water, the sand, and the shaded picnic tables. It sounds relaxing, but I was too hot, tired, and salty to really enjoy it. I couldn’t have been happier at 6:30 to hop in a van heading for Jerusalem.

Upon arrival, I looked for dinner in the city. All the restaurants were closed. Saturdays in Israel are the most frustrating day of the week.

When the sun I had greeted in the morning had finished its course across the sky and the first stars began to show their light (otherwise known as 8:30), the bus station opened. A lone café inside decided that it liked making money, and its being the only open food venue in Jerusalem made it a clear choice for dinner.

On the way home, I tried out a new bus route: instead of going to downtown Tel Aviv and taking another bus out to the suburbs, I took one direct to Bar Ilan University from which I could walk twenty-five minutes home. It might have saved time if there wasn’t half an hour of bus driver drama at the beginning—the guy literally pulled up, didn’t let anyone on, left and parked on the other side of the lot, got out and talked to a bunch of other drivers, and eventually someone else picked us up.

I made it home in the end, but these weekends wear me out. My bathing suit is still salty to the touch, my shorts duct-taped. On the bright side, I spent hardly anything on transportation, food, lodging, and admissions, and still had a great time. I hope I can keep this up.