Oh Wow!

Dearest friends,

We hope you had the merriest Christmas! We enjoyed the day where it
all began...In Bethlehem! We feasted on a not so traditional Christmas
feast of falafel, hummus and french fries. Do you think Jesus ate
falafel? I like to think so. Manger square was decked out with lights
and a huge live music stage featuring a Children's choir. It was an
interesting experience, to say the least, and a decent runner up to
being with our family and friends... We miss you!

Quick recap... Israel was fantastic and thought provoking. We have
some great stories about the characters we met, but let us just give a
shout out to Joel & Lindsay who we spent a few days with around
Christmas exploring the north - we had a blast with you guys!!

In Israel after leaving chillin' Jaffa Port we hit Jerusalem and
explored the obligatory Holy Sites in the Old City including a tour of
the tunnels under the Western Wall that take you as close as you can
go to where the Holy of Holies is said to be buried. Pretty
incredible - thanks for the tip Lisa! Up north we visited Peter's
House at the ruined city of Capernaum and hiked around Nimrod's Castel
where we made friends with a colony of groundhogs and picniced on the
roof of the castel (the signs with "!" mean "exciting things ahead"
right?).

We rented a car with Lindsay and Joel and Joel showed his best Mario
Cart skills on the Galilee Hills on our way to stay with Lindsays
family friends. Ekbal was like a great aunt and welcomed us into her
Palestinian home like we were her own children. She fed us like only a
Palestinian mother can...until you think you might actually burst!
Salads, homemade olives, hummos, and meat ... then more meat, and then
when we thought we were finally done there were still 3 more courses
of chicken, kebab, beef ... I think we have finally recovered but our
stomachs are definitely at least 2x the size as when we arrived. It's
so hard to say no because you want to be appreciative of their
hospitality. We tried to split a kebab and our host just said "no,
that's not good" and piled more meat on our plates! Almost like a
punishment! but it was SO good. Ok, if we told you about all our
overeating sprees we'd be here all day ...

Hiking up north was beautiful. From the top of Nimrod's Castel on Mt
Hebron we could see Lebanon on one side and Syria on the other. Oh the
magnificant Middle East!

After the north we took the car to spend a few hours soaking in the
Dead Sea with an infamous mud bath and getting lost in the gorgeous
Negev Desert on our way to Jordan.

Petra was amazing with the ever so profound words of "OH WOW" uttered
constantly throughout the day. There simply are no words to accurately
attest to the wonder of the stunning Rose Red City...you will have to
see it for yourselves. Or check out the 1000's of photos we took.
This is us in front of the famous Petra Monestary. The tiny blue blur
on Dwan's shoulder is actually a girl standing in the entrance ... it
is THAT big. When we got there one of the bedoin guides was climbing
up to the top and jumping between the eves! Everyone was clapping,
but really I think all the tourists were just waiting for him to fall
so their blogs home would be more exciting.

So right now we're sitting on the ferry from Jordan to Sinai to meet
up with our friend Geoff for a New Years Eve hike up Mt Sinai... just
in time to see the sun rise of the new year. After spending a few
much needed days on the beach of the Red Sea we will head to the main
land to check out the pyramids and other wonders of the ancient world.

We thank you for your love and support. May you have a blessed and
joyous New Year!

T&D