Following in Moses' footsteps?

The first night in Sharm, Christina and I were approached by a young man who worked for a travel agency. Perfect. We had wanted to go to Mt. Sinai, but we didn't know how we were going to get there, and for about 35 bucks, which included transportation, a guide, and breakfast, it wasn't a bad deal.

Two days later, we checked out of our hotel at the required deadline of noon, but our trip to Mt. Sinai didn't begin until 10pm, so we were forced to kill some time, lounging by the Red Sea and going snorkeling. I know, poor us!

10pm- We were picked up in the lobby of our hotel to start on our 3hour journey to the mountain base. Here's a picture of us when we first entered the mini-bus, still warm and excited...

1:30am- After three and a half hours of sitting next to the most obnoxiously drunk Russian and getting virtually no sleep, we arrived at St. Catherine's Monastary, where we would start the trek up the mountain by foot. We stayed in the bus until the very last moment, knowing that it was going to be cold and steep up to the peak of Mt. Sinai.

We had been warned that it would be cold, and we even put on our warmest layers of clothes we could find, but we were not prepared for the freezing climate we were going to face. Our fingers and toes became painfully stiff and numb at the same time. Our bodies shivered uncontrollably and our legs burned going up the last 700 stone-stairs to the peak. As long as we kept moving, it was semi-bearable...

We arrived at the top an hour before sunrise. We huddled together, hoping that would bring us the tiniest bit of warmth. We willed the sun to rise quicker and the rays to hit our red noses. It was the slowest, most miserable hour I could think of. Then, our guide came up from behind and placed a blanket around our shoulders...I think he felt sorry for us as we danced around to keep our blood flowing...but even this didn't help much at all.


At 6:30am the sun finally peeked up above the horizon. The crowd of people cheered at that first sight of the sun's rays. The beautiful scene set before us was difficult to enjoy under the conditions, but we were hopeful for the warmth that we believed would come soon.


Down the mountain we went, much quicker than we had ascended. With each step the warmth from the sun hit my face and gave me a sense of relief.
We basked in the sun for a few minutes at the bottom of the mountain and stared up at the daunting cliffs, waiting for the rest of the group to arrive.

Would I do it again? Insanely, probably yes, but only if I had gloves and a proper jacket...or it was the middle of the summer!