To the border

Kibbutzin it up!

True or False?

Like you would like to wander around this for 40 years either

Walking down into the well in Beersheba

Our first day of traveling didn't actually land us in Egypt that day, but we able to stop and see some amazing things on the way. We woke up bright and early and were on the bus by 7 am. Our first stop was in Beersheba and the Zin Wilderness outlook. Beersheba is where Abraham dug a well. NOt quite sure why that is important, but I'll figure it out. At the Zin Wildreness outlook, we were able to look out over the absolute baren land that the children of Israel spent most of their wandering years in. As we drove to these locations, I couldn't help but note how strikingly similar it looks like New Mexico. I was pretty sure for a while there that they had played a trick on all of us. We had to be driving from Shiprock to Gallup. They were only telling us that we were in Israel. We really were just on the rez. Then a sign with Arabic and Hebrew would sneak up on the side of the road and I would really believe we were in Israel. As we were looking out over the Judean Wilderness, I came to the realization that if I had been one of the Children of Israel, I would have given up after about 3 hours and headed back to Egypt. It was SO hot. I can understand why they just were unhappy and complained instead. After a quick lunch near Ben-Gerion's grave, we hopped back on the bus and went to Avdat. We were all so excited to just get to Egypt we were all wondering why we were making all these stops. None of us had a clue what Avdat was. We unloaded from the buses, squeezed 80 plus of us in a little room (with no air conditioning) to watch a horribly made video on an ancient nomadic people that placed roots where we were. They became successful traders, pottery makers, and booze drinkers. After the movie, we were all wondering why we stopped to come here. Then they drove us to the top of the hill and let us loose. There were ruins and we were allowed to walk through them, check them out, and play. It turned out to be one of the funnest parts of the day. There were millions of cool pictures to be taken, and beautiful views all over. There was one spot where there used to be a building but all that was left was an archway overlooking blue sky and miles of untouched desert. I grabbed one of my friends and we attempted to take fake engagement photos. They are not great because it was so spur of the moment. Everyone was still in the awkward "do I put my arm around you when we take pictures" phase at this point in the trip, so engagement photos were hilarious to take. It turns out we started a war, and now there are a few of us having a contest to see how many cool fake engagement photos we can snap in the world's best locations. After the ruins, we drove to the Israeli-Egyptian border and took a tour of a Kibbutz. A Kibubutz is a community of people who all work together and share all their profits equally. At this particular Kibbutz, they farmed dates, had a dairy farm, and raised horses. It was kind of odd. We then drove a short distance away and stayed the night at another Kibbutz. We got to the Kibbutz in the late evening and none of us were ready for bed. Having been stuck on a bus for a good part of the day, the creative wheels started turning and pretty soon most of us students were playing games and entertaining eachother. A few of our professors came out and joined us. I absolutley love the professors here. They are so down to earth and you can tell they are enjoying every minute as much as we are. After staying up way too late talking out on our front porches, we decided it was time to turn in and get some sleep for the next day's journey into Egypt.