My Golden Days of Hajj 2010 Part 1

In the Name of Allah Most Gracious Most Merciful

It is a great Blessing and Grace of Allah subhanahu wa ta'aala that we completed the Obligatory Hajj in the year 2010 (1431 Hijri).
My husband and I could perform the Hajj with all its rituals properly only with the help of Allah.
On the eve of 7th Dhul Hijjah 1431 which is 13th November 2010 we set our for Mina after Isha by bus. We were in Ihram and saying Talbiah when we started out from our home. We were doing Hajj al Ifrad in which the sacrificial animal is not necessary and one can directly wear the Ihram clothes for Hajj.
We had to go directly to Mina and perform the five obligatory prayers.
Our bus crossed the check point and headed towards Mina. We could see a lot of Hajis going toward Mina on foot from Jeddah. I could not believe that Allah had called me for this Great act of Hajj...I felt that a sinful and disobedient servant of Allah like me was given a chance to purify myself through this great duty toward Allah.
The bus was going and we were reciting the Talbiyah all along.
The Journey to Mina was not too long. After about one and a half hour we reached within the boundaries of Mina. Now we could see white tents spread far and wide till our sights could reach.
There were hundreds of thousands of tents in Mina for the Hajis (pilgrims) to stay.
Our bus dropped us just near our tent and all the pilgrims of that group took their belongings and proceeded to their respective tents.
We were allotted wrist bands on which our numbers were written which helped in identifying our tents and our train bookings for Muzdalifah and Arafat trips.
The Muallim with whom we were in a group was helping us all along. He got us settled down. After putting our baggage and performing the prayers we all kept ourselves busy in supplications and recitation of the Quran.
We were busy in our prayers when there was an announcement that due to the large amount of Hajis it is recommended that we set out for Arafat in the night itself!
We wondered it was recommended that one left for Arafat next morning after Fajr so how could this be possible!? But he convinced most of us saying that the crowd of pilgrims was too large so it is better to set out in the night itself.