Mount Sinai provides a nice hike. Moses knew this too. Perhaps he was just eager to get away from the unruly bunch that had followed him into the desert for some reason. Thousands of men, women, and children, and not a lot of granola bars to go round. Prophets could do worse than read the fine print on the contract.
“What do we do now? Are we there yet? How about we make this enormous golden calf, wouldn’t that be cool?”
“I don’t know. No, not by a long shot, and frankly, I have no idea where we are. And no, we’re not making a golden calf. These things are a bitch to schlep around in the desert. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some, er, worshipping to do, er, up there. On ye olde mountain where dwelleth Jove, I mean Jehovah. Make sure the kids are in bed by ten, and oh, if someone could start thinking about breakfast, that would be great. The way things have been going, it’s likely I’m going to be pissed off again about something. I might spare the rod if I’ve had, I don’t know, eggs benedict, fresh orange juice?”
And up he went. Sans the snaking path hewn and chiseled over the centuries by Christian monks the trek probably took Moses a bit longer than today’s hi-tech-sandaled backpacker. There was no one to sell him a three dollar Snickers along the way. And it gets chilly up there without the fire of God to light your belly. “Yes,” the Supreme Being whispered through the dried shrubbery, “all the way up here. As Gods go I’m a bit of a shy fellow. Come, come. Glad you could make it. We’ll have a good old chat. Hope Pharaoh didn’t give you too much grief. Quite the show I put on, right? The other Gods were so jealous. Wait, did I say that out loud? Shit, now I can’t let you into the Holy Land. Anyway, you’re not far now. Up you go.”
Today’s nightly traveler can rent a dingy mattress. Blankets too if you didn’t bring a sleeping bag. Evening hikes and sleep-over are the best, if you can stand the keen, jagged winds. The sunrise is more than worth it. If you happen to be up there on Easter morning, expect a busload of white-robed American evangelicals providing a rude wake-up call. Annoying if you happen to unslumber with a full blather. They were ‘friggin’ everywhere, chanting, clapping, posing for the twentieth grinning snap shot -bedraggled nonbeliever lurking in the background. Photoshops right out, I guess.
Sinai 