Camping in the Desert!

On Friday the 24 and Saturday the 25, we went camping in the desert.

Our day started with an interesting trip to an archaeological trip to a grave site and some caves.

There's us hiking to the graves.

The lime green speck is me!

Mom going to the viewing platform above the visitor center.

Us looking at the archaeological site.

Then we took a trip to the

MLEIHA, ARCHAEOLOGICAL CENTRE 

which is a whole story about how this part of the UAE got inhabited. There was a museum with a bunch of ancient jars, spearheads, beads, necklaces, bracelets, camels, horses, and other weapons. They also re-created a grave with a horse and a camel.

After that we went to our camp site!

At our campsite, we went on a evolutionary based rock/plant hunt.

When we got back it was already dark!

Lots of torches and lanterns surrounding our campsite

Then, we ate dinner that the Mleiha people cooked for us. We had a Arabic BBQ which was olives and breads and baba ghanouj and hummus and Biryani and lots of grilled meats: chicken legs, meatballs, kebabs. And unlimited sodas and water and karak (Indian boiled tea and milk).

 and had marshmellows over the campfire.

The fire ring of chairs

Arabian Majlis. Carpets on the sand!

After that, we looked at the moon through a giant computerized telescope 

 and some stars including the Pleiades and the Orion Nebula.

This is a picture the guide took with Dad's phone through the telescope. It's the Orion Nebula. Do you see what looks like a circular cloud of space dust? It's grey. Inside that there's a shape that looks like a half moon. That's no moon. It's actually four young stars inside a gas cloud, which will eventually turn into more new stars.

Then, we stayed up until 11:00 talking, sitting around the fire, and digging GIANT holes in the sand. We were going to sleep in our holes under the stars but our guide guy said there was a chance of scorpions and wasps. So we slept in our tents and when we woke up our giant holes were all filled in!

Day two, Saturday 25

We woke up early, at 4:45 am, to see the sun rise on the dunes. It is really hard to get 60 people organized into trucks but we did it! Made it in time to see the sun rise!

But I mostly spent my time sliding and rolling down hills.

Then we drove back to our campsite over the dunes! Our truck had a roll cage, and we sped over the dunes like there was no tomorrow!

After that we ate breakfast, here's the omlet stand:

dug more holes,

And went home.

Who we went with:

Our HENA (our homschool CO-OP. HENA stands for Home Education Network of Abu Dhabi) group, which in my class includes Sam, Bryce, William, Me, Greta, Phoenix, Alex, and others who I don't remember their names.

Why I went:

We had been wanting to go over the dunes in Fred, our Mitsubishi Pajero, and camp in the dunes, so when this chance appeared, we were all in. Also, it was a chance to get to know our fellow HENA students, and make more friends!

What my favorite part was:

Making friends. I was kinda a loner when I was at my CO-OP, but now I can just go "Hi ___, want to be partners?" or "Hey ___, do you know why ___ did ___?" etc etc etc. Friends were probably the thing I thought would be hardest to get, so it's a relief that I have some now.