Thanksgiving, Boy Scouts, and the Sinai

One of the most memorable Thanksgivings I think we'll have is the trip we took with the Boy Scouts into the Sinai desert over the Thanksgiving weekend 2009. It was incredible and incredibly cold. When they invited families of scouts to come along we thought it'd be a great opportunity to get in some camping while in Egypt. And what better place than Mt. Sinai and St. Catherine's?

When we arrived to our first campsite in the early afternoon, I wondered what we'd gotten ourselves into. The sun was still up but we were in the shadow of the mountain. It wasn't even dark and already I was cold. I began to worry about how we'd manage the complaining from the kids because I knew we hadn't packed enough warm clothes. I was sure the nights would be unbearable. Amazingly though, I was the biggest complainer the whole weekend.

We went on some amazing hikes. We were exhausted and dirty by the time we arrived back in Cairo but it was so worth it.

Here we are in front of the rock Moses touched and water came out. This was the first day as we were hiking into camp so we're all still happy and clean. Standing next to Clara on the far right is Nacia. Nacia has been a huge part of our stay here in Cairo. Read her blog here. She's in our branch and is so helpful and smart. She came for an internship. She has not had the typical tourist American experience. She's delved into true Egyptian life. When she heard about this trip, she asked if she could tag along. She was invaluable to us. She entertained our kids, showed the scouts some tricks, and was incredibly patient with our family. Throughout this year in Egypt she's been our tour guide, babysitter, and dear friend.



We camped at the base of St. Catherine's the first couple of nights. Some of the group's gear, like water, was brought in by camels. The scouts were required to carry their own gear but they allowed the families to use the camels to carry some of there stuff. I was amazed at how much weight those camels could carry.



Here we are hiking up St. Catherine's. This was the terrain. Now imagine a family of 9 with not much camping experience and no toilets. Todd's going to correct me on this I know, so let me clarify. I have 3 girls with little camping experience. They've never really learned how to "squat." And notice there are no big trees or bushes to hide behind. Only big rocks. It was challenging but a true camping experience.



More of our St. Catherine's hike.




The whole family made it to the saddle of St. Catherine's. Critter and Batman continued with the scouts up to the very top where they got to sign their name in a book that's placed there for those that summit. Nacia made it to the top too and signed her name and graciously dedicated her climb to our family--or something like that. Maybe someday I'll make it to the top and see what she really wrote.



The first night one of the families who were much more prepared than I could even think about, provided a Thanksgiving dinner for everyone with turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, sweet potatoes, stuffing, corn, cranberries, and little pie tartlet thingies for dessert. It was a great first night--other than the temperature. For most other meals we provided for ourselves. However, a couple of nights they provided us MRE's. Here we are trying to figure out how to work the MRE. It didn't turn out so great the first time. One half was hot, the other cold. By the last night we figured out a better system. In fact, to this day, if you ask Red what one of his favorite foods is, he'll tell you Beef Teriyaki. That's because on the last night of this trip he had a Beef Teriyaki MRE and it did look pretty delicious. I'm sure part of the reason he loved it so much was by that last night he was getting pretty hungry for some hot food.



T was a little nervous to be so close to the camel.



This was our campsite at the base of St. Catherine's. Notice the little stone shack. We had set up a 3-man tent on the flat area outside the shack with the thought the littlest kids may want to sleep in it. However, the first night everyone but Critter and Batman slept in it so we could keep each other warm. The second night we were told the shack was actually a bit warmer because it kept any wind from coming through. So the second night we all moved into that shack and we did sleep a bit more comfortably.



The next day we moved camp to Elijah's Basin--near the top of Mt. Sinai. Here's a picture of our tent with Sinai in the background. Elijah's Basin was even colder. It went down to freezing temperatures during the night. We battled the cold by putting all of us in the tent on this last night. Yes, all 9 of us in the 3 man tent. We didn't sleep comfortably but we were reasonably warm.



The original plan was to hike Sinai early in the morning of our last day. We arrived to Elijah's Basin earlier than planned so many decided to hike it the afternoon/evening we arrived. By that time though our family was pretty exhausted so we didn't go up. We decided to go with the original plan and wait til that next morning to see how we felt.

Early the next morning, Nacia came to the outside of our tent and woke us up to see if anybody wanted to hike up with her to watch the sunrise. We sleepily looked around and there were no takers so told her to go ahead without us. But now we were awake. I looked at Todd and told him I'd maybe like to go since I'd never done it (Todd went to the top of Sinai when he was here as a BYU student.) Then Petey and Critter decided they wanted to go too. Todd agreed to stay back with the younger kids.

We scrambled to find our shoes and coats so we could catch up to Nacia. Cricket decided she too wanted to go. So up we went. We were moving fast and Nacia was nowhere to be seen. The air was cold, our lungs were hurting, the sun was rising. We knew we wouldn't make it up to the top before the sunrise but still the views of the sunrise were spectacular. It's popular to do this hike for the sunrise so Sinai was pretty crowded with tourists--many of them praising the Lord and giving thanks to the Lord Almighty for providing them with this great mountain in Africa followed by shouts of "Amen."

Part way up, Cricket asked where we were going. I explained we were on our way to the top of Sinai. What else would we be doing? She thought we were getting out of the tent to go find the bathroom. (Elijah's Basin had some outhouses.) She didn't want to go to the top of Sinai. By this time though she was far enough up that she decided to continue.

Petey had to stop to catch her breath while Critter, Cricket and I trudged on to try to catch up to Nacia. We did stop just before the top when we realized we were missing the beautiful view of the sunrise in our quest to catch Nacia. So we stopped to catch our breath and enjoy the scenery. Petey caught up to us and we continued on up to the top after the sunrise. We hadn't been up there long when Batman showed up. He'd decided to come on up. The top isn't that big and there's really only one way up and down and we didn't see Nacia.

We took this picture at the top of Sinai. Don't they look happy?



So to conclude the long story, on our way down back to camp we met up with Nacia who was on her way up to find us. Turns out, when she woke us up to ask if we wanted to hike with her to see the sunrise, she only meant on one of the big rocks near our camp--she didn't mean Sinai. So she'd gone to a completely different place. When she came back to camp she was told that we had followed her up Sinai and felt bad so she came to find us. That's ok though. I'm so glad we did it and we can say we climbed to the top of Sinai.

Here's T, Todd, and Red saying goodbye to the camels before we leave back to Cairo. Notice the Bedouin men in the background.



Nic showing us her sweatshirt after 4 days of camping.



The monastery at the bottom of Sinai was closed when we came down so we didn't get to see that. I guess that will be a reason to return to Egypt someday. Here's our final family picture with Sinai in the background. An amazing, unforgettable adventure over.