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Another Dramatic Recap
Jul. 18th, 2004 08:18 amEilat was awesome! This will be another long entry, so I'll dive right in.
*dons livejournal snorkel*
*SPLASH!*
Two Days Ago: Friday, July 16
On Friday, we left the village early in the morning. I was really craving mango, so I had some mango juice on the bus (the driver sells various beverages). We had breakfast at a small restaurant along the way (the food is good, but I'm getting sick of eggs, which we have far too often).
A little later in the morning, we stopped at a store at Yutveta, a dairy farming kibbutz in the middle of the desert. In an amazing coincidence, I met Lee Reis there (I recognized him as someone I knew, but I could not figure out where I knew him from; he remembered me, however). Lee is traveling around Israel with a USY tour. I had not expected to meet someone I knew who was not in our group during the trip, so it was a pleasant surprise. (Xave, Lee sends greetings.)
We arrived in Tel Aviv and had lunch at the field school. (Note: I was mistaken about the nature of the field schools that the group is staying in. The Field Schools, despite their name, are not affiliated with the Weizmann Institute in any way. Rather, they are a series of hostels run by the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel. We will also be staying at a Field School, the Ein Gedi Field School, on our final, long trip to the desert.)
After lunch, we went swimming and snorkeling in the Gulf of Eilat (part of the Red Sea) at the beach just across the street from the Field School. The coral was beautiful, and there were fish of almost every imaginable size, shape, and color. The day was very hot and windy (felt like 45° C (113° F) with wind heat factor), so the cool water was very refreshing.
Afterwards, I took a walk with some other participants down to a local store for a snack. (I got a mango smoothie.)
In the evening, we went to the Texas Ranch for dinner. The ranch was a movie set for some old western. Afterwards, it was purchased by its current owners and turned into a restaurant and tourist attraction. The town looked like something straight out of the stereotypical Wild West, but with camels and Israeli food. After dinner there was dancing, disco style. I really wasn't in the mood for dancing, but the music was good (although it made me really miss DDR, especially since they played "Long Train Runnin'" and "Heaven").
At about 10:30, we went downtown to enjoy Eilat's night life. There was shopping, food, and even a miniature amusement park. The decision of whether to get something alcoholic (as some of my peers were doing; the drinking age is 18 in Israel) was made easy by the fact that I didn't have my ID (I had removed it from my wallet when I went to the beach, as a precaution in case I lost the wallet). I got another mango smoothie instead (I really ODed on mango that day). I also went on a spinning swings ride (swings hang down from a circular base that spins, it was like the "Yo-Yo" at Geauga Lake / Six Flags Ohio before Six Flags removed it). The ride was fun, and the nostalgia made up for the fact that it was a little expensive (although I probably was the only one on the ride who was over the age of ten).
We returned to the Field School by bus (although a few participants stayed out later and took a cab home), and went to sleep.
Yesterday: Saturday, July 17
On Saturday, after breakfast at the Field School, we spent most of the day on a cruise in the Gulf of Eilat. The morning was spent touring the Gulf. Some people, not including me, went tubing (riding rubber "tire tubes" pulled behind a motor boat) or riding on banana boats (rubber cylindrical tubes pulled behind a motor boat). After a while, the boat stopped, and there was an opportunity for swimming off of the boat, which was a lot of fun. Lunch was served on the boat, and it was quite good. After lunch, I and some other people went parasailing. (Parasailing is flying on a harness under a parachute pulled by a motorboat. By changing the length of the line between the boat and the parachute and the speed and direction of the boat, the driver of the boat can control the altitude and motion of the sailing person.) The ride was an incredible rush, gliding down to skim the water and then shooting up to look down at the town from above, and well worth the cost (120 NIS ≈ $30 US). I'm not a roller-coaster person, as I dislike rides that make me feel like I am falling, but I love rides that make me feel like I am flying. Afterwards, the ship headed in, and we saw dolphins swimming just a few meters from the boat as we entered the marina.
After the cruise, we returned to the field school, packed, and headed "home." We stopped at another field school above a gigantic crater in the desert for dinner and to view the crater from an overlook.
Today:
Only a few days of lab work remain. I am working on image completion again. My lab partner came up with a different algorithm for image completion that is incredibly efficient, so I am doing some further experimentation with this algorithm. This afternoon, there is a lecture on "Chaos in Science."
*dons livejournal snorkel*
*SPLASH!*
Two Days Ago: Friday, July 16
On Friday, we left the village early in the morning. I was really craving mango, so I had some mango juice on the bus (the driver sells various beverages). We had breakfast at a small restaurant along the way (the food is good, but I'm getting sick of eggs, which we have far too often).
A little later in the morning, we stopped at a store at Yutveta, a dairy farming kibbutz in the middle of the desert. In an amazing coincidence, I met Lee Reis there (I recognized him as someone I knew, but I could not figure out where I knew him from; he remembered me, however). Lee is traveling around Israel with a USY tour. I had not expected to meet someone I knew who was not in our group during the trip, so it was a pleasant surprise. (Xave, Lee sends greetings.)
We arrived in Tel Aviv and had lunch at the field school. (Note: I was mistaken about the nature of the field schools that the group is staying in. The Field Schools, despite their name, are not affiliated with the Weizmann Institute in any way. Rather, they are a series of hostels run by the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel. We will also be staying at a Field School, the Ein Gedi Field School, on our final, long trip to the desert.)
After lunch, we went swimming and snorkeling in the Gulf of Eilat (part of the Red Sea) at the beach just across the street from the Field School. The coral was beautiful, and there were fish of almost every imaginable size, shape, and color. The day was very hot and windy (felt like 45° C (113° F) with wind heat factor), so the cool water was very refreshing.
Afterwards, I took a walk with some other participants down to a local store for a snack. (I got a mango smoothie.)
In the evening, we went to the Texas Ranch for dinner. The ranch was a movie set for some old western. Afterwards, it was purchased by its current owners and turned into a restaurant and tourist attraction. The town looked like something straight out of the stereotypical Wild West, but with camels and Israeli food. After dinner there was dancing, disco style. I really wasn't in the mood for dancing, but the music was good (although it made me really miss DDR, especially since they played "Long Train Runnin'" and "Heaven").
At about 10:30, we went downtown to enjoy Eilat's night life. There was shopping, food, and even a miniature amusement park. The decision of whether to get something alcoholic (as some of my peers were doing; the drinking age is 18 in Israel) was made easy by the fact that I didn't have my ID (I had removed it from my wallet when I went to the beach, as a precaution in case I lost the wallet). I got another mango smoothie instead (I really ODed on mango that day). I also went on a spinning swings ride (swings hang down from a circular base that spins, it was like the "Yo-Yo" at Geauga Lake / Six Flags Ohio before Six Flags removed it). The ride was fun, and the nostalgia made up for the fact that it was a little expensive (although I probably was the only one on the ride who was over the age of ten).
We returned to the Field School by bus (although a few participants stayed out later and took a cab home), and went to sleep.
Yesterday: Saturday, July 17
On Saturday, after breakfast at the Field School, we spent most of the day on a cruise in the Gulf of Eilat. The morning was spent touring the Gulf. Some people, not including me, went tubing (riding rubber "tire tubes" pulled behind a motor boat) or riding on banana boats (rubber cylindrical tubes pulled behind a motor boat). After a while, the boat stopped, and there was an opportunity for swimming off of the boat, which was a lot of fun. Lunch was served on the boat, and it was quite good. After lunch, I and some other people went parasailing. (Parasailing is flying on a harness under a parachute pulled by a motorboat. By changing the length of the line between the boat and the parachute and the speed and direction of the boat, the driver of the boat can control the altitude and motion of the sailing person.) The ride was an incredible rush, gliding down to skim the water and then shooting up to look down at the town from above, and well worth the cost (120 NIS ≈ $30 US). I'm not a roller-coaster person, as I dislike rides that make me feel like I am falling, but I love rides that make me feel like I am flying. Afterwards, the ship headed in, and we saw dolphins swimming just a few meters from the boat as we entered the marina.
After the cruise, we returned to the field school, packed, and headed "home." We stopped at another field school above a gigantic crater in the desert for dinner and to view the crater from an overlook.
Today:
Only a few days of lab work remain. I am working on image completion again. My lab partner came up with a different algorithm for image completion that is incredibly efficient, so I am doing some further experimentation with this algorithm. This afternoon, there is a lecture on "Chaos in Science."
