November 10th Mt. Sinai and goodbyes...

This morning our alarm went off at midnight and I was seriously thinking twice about this trip up a mountain at one in the morning. Kalie and I were not able to get to sleep cause we kept talking and so we only got like a few hours of sleep. I also didn't know what to wear so I just threw on a whole bunch of layers. We walked down to where we would meet everyone and everyone looked so tired...it was hilarious. Then I got one of those highs where I was really tired and excited at the same time and it was all good! I also bought a snickers because I knew that four hours that early in the morning would take a lot of energy. When we got to the mountain, we met our guide that would guide us up the mountain. We were offered to take a camel. Ashlee, Emilie, and Mrs. Beth chose to do that, but I didn't want to! My group was Nick, Alyssa, Elinor, and Skylar and Sam Scanlon. We divided into groups to make sure that everyone would stick together. Our group was in the front. Skylar and I made a video, but obviously you couldn't see anything since it was really dark...but it's funny to listen to what we were saying...

my group :)

finally at the top, trying to keep warm!

The walk up was so long and at times it was really challenging. I started to sweat a lot and decided to take off my jacket. I was really glad that I bought the snickers though...I needed energy. When we finally got about five minutes to the top, we stopped for a while and waited for it to be closer to the sunset. We were told that we made really good timing, so we had time to kill...but it was sooooooo cold! When it was time for sunset, we walked up the rest and it was so worth it. It was beautiful...Emily Rice read us some of the scripture from Exodus about Moses walking up the mountain and the ten commandments..then we sang. It was so moving and so beautiful. On the way down, I was blessed with a really good conversation with Mandy Adams :)

Later, after a shower and a tiny nap, we went back to the mountain and visited St. Catherines Church. This is also where we said goodbye to Osman. It was really sad and a lot of us cried :( He
was by far the best tour guide...EVER.

Then we spent the next few hours driving and driving to the border...skipping lunch and I spent most of the ride reading The Hunger Games...(this book has been passed around pretty much all of the girls on this trip).

ashlee took a picture of me reading

We got to the border, and basically to say a long story short, we waited FOREVER at both borders. We first entered Israel, but then had to go to Jordan...

This was basically the longest day of my life...although it was worth it! I was very thankful for a bed at night.