A bug hit me hard last night, making it a worse sleep than even mosquito night. An ibuprofen has got me out of bed. I wrote this before and simply make a few edits before posting.
I continue my list of curious similarities between Albright and me, looking at more of his travels in the 1920s and mine today. If you missed the first post introducing this series, read it first. Quotes are from his biography, with page numbers in parentheses. My comments are in brackets.
13. Albright went on lots of exploration trips while he lived in Palestine. He went to many of the same sites that I have traveled to on my own. The purpose of the trips was ‘archaeological, topographical, and folkloristic ‘ (88). [I don’t use the word “folkloristic,” but otherwise sounds good.]
14. Albright taught summer school and took the groups to places of interest in and around Jerusalem, as well as up to Syria (127). [I only wish I could go to Syria.]
15. The Albrights liked to spend a week by the Sea of Galilee (125). From here they would make day-trips to the various archaeological sites in the area (149). [That was me last week!]
16. At Ashkelon, they stopped for examination of a mound, lunch, and a swim in the wonderful surf on that beach, then continued to Mejdel and spent the night in a flea-invested khan (inn)” (75). [What is it about Ashkelon that keeps attracting Americans to its beach? There are many beaches in Israel, but Ashkelon’s pull seems irresistible.]
17. Albright concluded his report on a trip, “If we could always find as many new things as we did on this trip, we should be kept busy registering our discoveries” (121). [My discoveries are on a different order, but they make me feel good. And that’s what matters. :-)]
18. In Turkey, “he made a five-day trip driving almost 1400 kilometers visiting excavations” (269). [In April, I made a 8-day trip driving about 2900 kilometers (1800 miles) through Turkey. One difference: Albright never drove.]
Albright Institute in Jerusalem
19. “They averaged twenty-five miles in nine hours of walking each day” (89). [I don’t believe it. Well, I believe they walked 9 hours each day; I don’t believe they knew how to compute distances on a walking trip. That would be nearly 3 mph with no rests. 20 miles is a full day’s walk.]