The Golan- 3 great days

Oct 3

We woke up 630 and went to get our visa's and to pack for survival week.

I got my 90L hiking bag at the post office today just in time from home. We all packed and got ready. Sleeping bag, shorts, bathing suit, sweatshirt, my bathroom stuff even though were going to the desert or mountains someplace with no showers ( I have room for it why not? I put my small pillow , first aid kit, knives, flash light, headlamp, Off bug spray (I never got a misquote bite but I brought it anyways) , sunglasses , camera, 6 liters of water  (4 bottles that we can refill , not sure how yet but we'll find out) my phones ( I brought an extra battery for blackberry), and the rest of the bag is packed with food, protein bars and organic lollipops (my family just sent me them from Brooklyn!!) canned tuna, a loaf of bread, some apples and cucumbers. That's all for now.

We all finished packing and went outside to talk to one of the commanders. They gave us a few other things we need. Rope, mini propane tanks,a compass, plates and a spoon, fork and knife in 1, it's pretty cool.

My bag ended up being almost 70lbs. We finally left for a long drive up north. We took a break to get food about half way into the trip. We got off the bus and it was so humid at around 5pm

We finally got to the camp site after getting lost a few times and getting pulled over for an illegal u turn.

First thing we did was eat of course and meet a retired Commander from Sayeret Matkal. He knows a lot about everything that goes on in  the army.

We learned how to read a topographical map and how to measure how far you are walking.

We are all splitting up tomorrow into 4 groups and we have to follow the map we just learned how to read by ourselves. Let's see how that works out.

We set up camp , my bed is a sheeet on dirt and I'm actually pretty comfortable. No covers, no sleeping bag. I don't get bitten by bugs anyways so its fine. You can here the coyotes howling right next to us.They usually like humans so its fine and we have one person doing guard duty to make sure they don't kill us lol.

At 2:30am  I was woken up for guard duty. I have my pants tucked into my socks and my sweatshirt tucked into my pants and I'm comfortable on the look out for coyotes.

10/4
We woke up at 530am after sleeping for an hour. The coyotes were howling all night 20 feet away from us. So annoying.

We had some coffee for pre-breakfast but I had a protein bar  as well.We started our hike in the Golan Heights. The first part of  the hike was 3 -4km not too long. After that we sat down to eat breakfast. Then continued on

.We then had to do a team exercise and we tied a rope connecting all of us. So around 9 guys connected to each rope with 2 teams. It was very annoying and hard to walk. We walked like that for another 4km. We got to the first pool of water and I went in and stubbed my toe on a rock so I left the pool.

 The commander Eliezer from Sayeret Matkal told us that we will climb up to 400meters. We were at 80 right now. With our bags its going to be hard. We walked  or 2 hours up hill and we got to a huge pool with a waterfall we all got in so fast (I stubbed my toes again) but I stayed in it and it felt so good. We then walked another few kilometers to the next waterfall. We sat there and ate dinner.
Then more hiking. Got to the top. We were standing in the exact spot where part of the Six Day War took place. It was destroyed, bullet holes everywhere and bunkers destroyed and everything was shattered.
The commanders told someone to pretend to be hurt and built a stretcher out of wood and string. We carried him on it for a while, but thank g-d. He was too heavy for it and it broke so we didn't have to carry it anymore.

We got dropped off and then had to do another team exercise .

We traveled through the city and wrote numbers on rocks that they set up. We had a map and that's all. My group finished first and we ended up in the place where we ended up eating dinner and sleeping.

We ate dinner next to soccer field and made a fire. We made bread on the fire and soup. Some other people were frying hotdogs. Pretty sick dinner.

Eliezars friend from Sayeret Matkal came and told us army stories.

One was about him dressing up as Syrian soldier and doing patrol in Syria in order to catch some important people. They succeeded and they held those people until the Syrians gave us back the 3 Israeli Pilots that they were holding in their prisons. It worked.
Then I passed out in the middle so I missed the other stories .I was too tired. But I'm going to ask people about the stories he told.

 Tonight we sleep on a bunch of rocks again. But its my favorite part of the day right now.


On Wed we woke up 5:00am, after a night of hard rocks pushing into your back.

I slept ok though. The coyotes only woke me up once. We prayed Shacharit and watched the sunrise.

We started our hike around 6:00am

We walked towards the mountains which the spot we slept. First we went out into large field with thorn bushes everywhere. We ate breakfast, tuna and some other things I bought (I snuck out of the camp area and went to the grocery store last night, shh)

 After that Eliezer showed us how to filter out dirty water .You put the water from a lake in the bottle and then use your shirt as a filter and pour it into another bottle. Then we did a group exercise. We tied a lot of ropes into a circle. We all stood around it and pulled it out as far as we could.

Coby had to walk on the rope once around the circle while we held it . It was hard to hold but really cool. Then he showed us the proper way to drink out of a lake or pool or anything with water. Never lay down. Stay on one knee and pick the water up with your hands, because if there is an enemy behind you, you  can turn around faster and he has less of a chance to attack you.

We then went to a part where there was a lot of big bushes . He showed us how to hide in them. You have to cut a hole, sit in it and cover it the right way. The leaves have to be on the same side otherwise it sticks out a lot and you can be spotted.

We split up into a few groups and hid one of the guys. Everyone had to find the other groups guys. After that we walked a few kilometers through a field with a lot of thorn buses.

 We got there and he showed us how to hide a mine and spot one. You have to make the area where you put it look natural after your done.

We all split into groups again hid our sleeping bags and looked for them after.

We put ours in a hole in the ground and covered it with leaves. People stepped on it while looking so we succeeded.

After that we split into 2 teams . We made a circle and one person was blind folded. There  were 7 cans in the circle that the blind folded person had to find. His team mates had to lead him to them only by saying code words not left right back or forward it was pretty funny watching.

 We then started walking again. We got to a small lake!! We all jumped off the cliff into the lake. It was so refreshing. I found a higher ledge so I jumped off that one too. We left there and went far again. We ended up by the next small lake that was a few kilometers away.

 It was a long and hard walk. If you trip you can fall off the mountain. It’s expert hiking trails known by a lot of people. We ended up by the second lake with a huge waterfall. We ate lunch there. Pasta,tuna, corn . We cooked the pasta in our pot on our portable burner. We mixed all the food together and ate it. We cleaned our plates in the lake packed them and left. I had apples I bought for dessert. On the way we were walking and there were horses on our left we stopped to pet them.. Pretty dumb I think but whatever.

The next spot we were going was one of the harder parts of the day. We walked all the way down the mountain which put us in a valley.We walked through the valley which was covered by trees and only uneven rocks on the floor. You have to move slowly or you'll get pretty hurt, especially with all the weight from your bag on your back. We stopped half way because there was a small waterfall where we filled up our bottles. We were in a valley and the only way out was up!

 We walked back up another mountain, around 300 meters. Then we walked through a huge field then back down the mountain.

We all thought we were done because of how tiring it was but we weren't. We were in a valley again so we went all the way back up the next mountain and back down the other side. There was a big stream on the other side! We had some time to go in. I didn't because I was too lazy to take my stuff off. I ate my grapes instead.

We thought we would be done once again. Now we had to walk all the way back up!!!! We walked up and this was really one of the hardest things I've done.

We all walked up the really steep mountain. It was hard but everything we do is worth it.

We got to the top and walked straight and found a place to pray Mincha. After that we walked down a dirt road on our left was the sunset right over the Kineret . It was the nicest view I've ever seen in my life.

As we were walking down the road on our left were a bunch of bull and cows staring us down the whole way. We finally came to the end and the bus was waiting for us. We all got in the bus and left to go eat. We ate on the beach right by the Kineret. After dinner we sat in a circle with the commanders. Eliezer asked all of us what was one of the things we learned. I said that its good to over pack your bag to make it heavier, so if you are ever carrying something little lighter it will be easier because you are used to having a lot of weight. When they tell us it’s all in your head, it’s true. I never thought I could do all that we just did in a million years. You just have to push yourself and get and give some support from others is all you need and you can do almost anything.

We said goodbye to Eliezer and he invited us over for dinner and if we need a place to stay when we have time off .We finally got on the bus to go home to Jerusalem. I changed into shorts a tank top and sandals. My feet had no blisters but they were kind of beat up.

Its 9:30 at night and were on the way back to Jerusalem now. We are going to go to sleep as soon as we can.

Overall these last few days in the Golan were best 3 days I had in Israel so far even though I lived outdoors with coyotes, didn't shower or even wash my hands with indoor plumbing and walked up and down more mountains than I ever thought possible.

You feel you have accomplished so much in the end.