It’s nearly 8pm on Sunday and in less about two hours I’m going to be heading to the airport for my 130 flight back to Dubai. It’s been a long time coming and although I don’t really want the summer to end, I knew and expected this day would come, so no whining and man-up.
I headed for the top of a mountain that overlooks the city this morning. It’s kind of a big deal touristy thing that I had to do. I did Google the route and pretty much knew where I should go, but I ended up getting lost, not bad lost, but lost enough that I decided to take a taxi the rest of the way. The problem was the stairs that I had to take, I mean Google maps doesn’t show hills in map mode, so I had no idea that I was going to climb about 1000 steps. The funny thing is that there were outdoor escalators for going down but not up. I’m dumbfounded. By the time I was at the top of the stairs I was literally drenched in sweat, but the good thing was that all the people around me were too so I fit in.
The taxi dropped me at the cable car that carries passengers up to the top of the hill. Like I mentioned, this trip is a must-do trip for tourists, and the cable car is a must-do as well. I got to the observation deck and started to take massive amounts of photographs. The problem is, is that I didn’t take many with me in them, and after a while there are only so many photos you can take of a city. It was so pretty though I didn’t want to leave. I noticed that there were people walking along a sidewalk below, many were drenched in sweat, and others where wearing workout clothes. So I decided that I would go that direction on the way back.
The path wound around the mountain next to the observation platform. Every sort of person you can imagine was using the path, there were walkers, hikers, runners, dog walkers, and every other kind of person so I fit right in. I don’t know the distance, but I’d guess that the trail was about 5k, but it was asphalt and level so the distance went very fast. I wasn’t through when the trail ended either, in fact I was just getting started. I headed down another path, then another, and eventually I was getting close to my hostel, maybe 15 km from the peak… though that’s just a guess. I’m still sore tonight, so it may have been even further than that.
