Israel/Jordan Trip - Part 1

Last week, Breanna and I took a trip to Israel and then to Jordan.  We spent Sunday traveling, Monday in the Old City, Tuesday in Bethlehem, the Old City and Ramallah, Wednesday in Tel Aviv, Thursday traveling back to Egypt, Friday in Jordan (Petra and Amman) and Saturday in Jordan (Amman and the Dead Sea) and traveling back to Cairo.  

Our travel Sunday began at about 5 AM in Cairo.  We got up and headed to the bus station here in order to be on time for our 6 AM bus.  Naturally, as this is Egypt and perhaps because of the sensitivity of where we were traveling (the border is at Taba) the bus left at 7 AM, not 6 AM.  We arrived in Taba that afternoon, and walked to the border crossing.  The crossing was actually pretty painless, aside from the fact the Egyptian passport officer didn't comprehend the request to stamp outside of our passport.  He even told Breanna "Yes, yes, okay!" and then went ahead and did the opposite of what she asked.  If I haven't mentioned it to you or in this forum yet, I'm somewhat glad to be leaving this country, for reasons exactly like this paragraph.

We cross the border, and are just on the outskirts of the Israeli town Eilat (pronounced uh-lot).  A ten minute wait and we hopped on the bus (running on time and much cleaner in Israel) to the central bus station in Eilat.  We waited there for about an hour, and caught the 5 PM (or around there) bus to Jerusalem via the Dead Sea Road.  That drive was incredible.  To the east was the dead sea, and we drove along the coast for at least half the ride.  That night also happened to be the night of the full moon, and it was the largest full moon of the year.  It was great to see the moon reflecting off the water.  

In Jerusalem we hopped on another bus to head towards the Old City.  Upon arrival, everything was very, very closed.  We found the one hostel we'd heard about that we were planning to stay in, checked in, and wandered over to a very new mall right outside the gate of the Old City.  In what would be our most expensive meal on the trip, we each had a sandwich and a glass of water at an über-hip café.  Some Googling for our tour the next day, and we were off to bed, about 20 hours of travel that only covered 254 miles later, in one of the holiest and most controversial places in the world

The next day is kind of long, so that will get it's own post, probably tomorrow; same with the rest of the trip.