Bringing Joel Home--Road Trip (Part 3)

(Nov 16th, 2011)

We finally were getting some good looks at the "gorge".  It took us about 2-2.5 hours to get this far out of the city.  It was totally worth it!

I just LOVE the people... and the umbrella.

This is at a little town just before we got to the monastery.

Rock face.  And you can see another example of the fences most homes have around them.

Coming up to the monastery.  (I just saw the sign on the tree as I was posting this!  Oops.)

We took a HIKE in the THIN air on some very rocky terrain.  It was only about a 10 minute hike, but we were winded.  And the guys who were with us were not.  At all.  Lazy Americans.  ;)

This is where a famous guy spent lots of time in prayer.  (You'll see his name below.)  It is a very sacred place.  You  had to take you shoes off --and most people washed themselves before they went into this area.

When we first came in, there were a few people kneeling in prayer over in front of this little tent.  The guy in the picture was with us.  (Thank goodness!)  He is a guard for the monastery and I think he just wanted to make a little money guiding us up the mountain.  Please don't think that we actually needed a guard with a gun (ahem...MOM!).

The very holy man who prayed here...  "St. Teklehynot."  The story about him is that he was kneeling in prayer so often that he lost part of his leg below the knee.  (More about this later.)

Some local vegetation

These trees were SO pretty!

Our guide again.

More to follow....