on the way home

My last day camping in Eilat was pretty low key. We spent the day at the beach and made the 5 hour drive back to Tel Aviv. Even though I had been staying at my girl Shara’s crib during my stay, since she’s been working and I was traveling, we only spent a little bit of time really catching up. So the ride back was nice-it gave us the chance to chat about old times and people. Well I should say we caught up when I wasn’t sleeping LOL.

I had a bit of trouble figuring out how to spend my last day in Israel. I toyed with the idea of going back to Jerusalem. There were some sites that I wanted to see that I didn’t get to in my two days there. Then I thought about going to Akko, a town about two hours north of Tel Aviv. But when I woke up this morning, I decided that I didn’t want to deal with traveling and opted for a day at the beach instead! Especially when I heard that it was cold in DC-I figured I should get my beach on while I could. Tel Aviv is off of the Mediterrainian Sea-and the water is a beautiful shade of royal blue. While the water wasn’t as clear as the Red Sea, it was still pretty clear and very comfortable temperature wise. Now as much as I love the beach, there is one thing that truly annoyed me during each and every trip to the sea that I made…men in itty bitty swim trunks. They weren’t even trunks, more like speedos. And of course it was never the cute, buff, young stud wearing them. Almost without fail it was some old grimey dude with a belly bigger than Santa’s. Why is that? Supposedly it’s “very european,” but wherever it comes from I wish they would stop!

I stayed at the beach to watch the sun set. Even though I’ve seen the sut set several times in Israel, something seems even more spectacular when watching the sunset from the beach. The sun looks so close to you that you could sail to it…and then it just slowly sinks into the water. The sun seems to set so early here (considering that the high was 87 degrees-I always associate early nightfall with cold weather). I then headed back to have dinner with Shara.

I got to the airport more than two hours before my flight. But it took me about an hour and change to clear security. I don’t know whether to be annoyed or thankful that they are so thorough. There were FIVE different lines I had to go thru for someone to check either my bags or passport. Yes I said five. I think that I was in the “racially profiled” check in group-which just made everything take forever. All of my security lines were super short, but super slow. So the first line comes BEFORE you even check in for your flight. Someone checked my passport and asked me a series of questions (why were u here, who were u visiting, how do you know eachother). Then all of my bags went thr a security screening. Then (bc I think I was in the profiled line lol) someone else opened all my bags and hand searched my items. Then I could check in.

So I am on the plane now gotta go. Will finish soon! -I still have some things I want to post regarding actually getting on the plane (big ordeal) and some overall thoughts once I have a chance to digest my short, but super packed trip…I will make my last post once I get home! Shalom 🙂