Day 37: Dams and Toilet Paper

April 6: We woke up for our regular 7:00am breakfast and an absolutely stunning sunrise over King Talal Reservoir, and hit the trail about an hour later at 8:00. The skies were mostly overcast, but temperatures were warm--even early in the morning.

'Twas a stunning sunrise over King Talal Reservoir!

The trail took us down to the lake and across the dam. The dam is a big one with a height of 106 meters (about 350 feet), and is one of the largest dams in Jordan. I wouldn't drink from it, though. Not only is it littered with huge quantities of trash, but it stores treated wastewater from Amman (as well as winter rains) for use in agriculture.

But it's an impressive dam and was fun to walk across.

The wildflowers today were amazing! So much color! So many flowers!

But it was a relatively short and easy day of hiking, and there isn't much to report. The dam and the wildflower superbloom was it.

We reached camp, which wasn't anywhere near as scenic as the one we woke up to in the morning but it got the job done.

The 18 weekend hikers who joined us yesterday morning departed and it was nice to have a relatively small group again.

While chatting with Karolina about Ernie and silly pranks, a new idea popped into my head to TP Ernie's tent. Nobody TPs a tent! People TP all sorts of stuff: houses and cars and such, but a tent? That would be funny! So while Ernie and Jan were chatting with others in the common area, I sneaked over to his tent and threw a little toilet paper around it.

But it was a wasted effort. Jan wound up finding the toilet paper and cleaned it up. I'm not even sure if Ernie ever saw it. *shaking head* And nobody seemed to think it was very funny anyhow.

So that prank turned out disappointing. I'll have to think of something better next time.....

King Talal Dam. That big white area behind it...

Massive amounts of trash. *nodding*

The wildflowers were awesome! Absolutely breathtaking!

But watch out for snakes!

Don't worry--I got him before he bit me! ;o)