I taught 3 units of Berlitz today: 9:30-11:45.
I ate lunch early (weenie sandwiches and a salad) and then headed over to Bassia's, where I shared a taxi with her over to the Camel Ranch.
Bassia had received a birthday present (for her birthday, which was way back in December) of money for a camel trek, a total of 4 hours. Her husband wasn't interested in it, but I was, so I joined her, and we had a great time. The weather was really perfect today, with fairly hot sunshine, but not excessive, and a cool breeze.
We started the adventure with our guide, Or, telling a bit about camels and how to handle them. Although the Camel Ranch does have males, only females are used for the public to ride. Then we headed up Nakhal Shlomo and, a short distance up, turned left into a tributary nakhal. There were four of us besides the guide -- the other two were a young couple from Mexico City. We each controlled our own camel (or at least tried to), but, basically, the camels knew the way. The guide had told us not to let them eat the wild vegetation (that was there due to the amount of rain we had had during the winter), but, of course, if a 700-kg (1540-lb) animal is determined to do something, there's not too much you can do to prevent it. My camel (named "Adi"), in particular, was quite intent on sampling the luscious greens along the way.
After winding around and up and up for quite some distance, we finally reached the top of a hill on the south side of Nakhal Shlomo with a great view. The camels all sat down (the choreography of which is quite amazing), and we all got off and took a break and many pictures. Today's pic of the day is one of them, a selfie of me and my camel, Adi:
When it was time to go, we returned via a different route. The first part of the trail down was quite steep, so, instead of riding the camels (which could have been quite uncomfortable for us), we led them (and learned how to do that, as well). When we got to a more level area, we again got back on and rode, but this time the camels were all linked together, and our guide walked along, leading the first camel. This was because we were about to enter Nakhal Shlomo, where there could be vehicles, other people, and animals.
Before we got back to the Camel Ranch, we stopped near a fire pit and once again got off our camels. We took blankets that we had been sitting on on the camels and put them on the ground around the fire pit, where our guide built a nice fire. When it was going well, he put a pot of tea on it (or more like IN it!) to heat while he made bedouin pita (rather like Druze bread) for us. While we drank the delicious tea, he put a dome of metal over the fire and cooked the pita on it. Then he spread labane (a soft white cheese made from yogurt) on the pita, folded it somewhat like a burrito, and served it to us.
After we had finished eating, our guide packed all the utensils etc. back on his camel, we mounted our camels one by one, and we all returned rather quickly to the Camel Ranch.
It was a MOST enjoyable experience, and I highly recommend it to anyone!
Bassia and I took a taxi back to her place, and, after a short visit there, I walked back home.
My phone thinks I walked a total of 10.2 kilometers today, but I think most of that was actually the CAMEL walking!
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