Category: 2022 Epic Adventure

The internet just came back up after being down since we got back at 3:30pm. Not sure how long it will stay up; hopefully long enough to get this posted. But, alas, it did not. Now it’s Thursday morning and I hope to get this finished and posted before we move to Greece on Friday.

Yesterday (Wednesday) was the last full day of our tour. The brochure calls it an 8-day tour but the first day was just dinner and today was just breakfast. So, for all practical purposes, it was only 6 days. And this last one was a good one. Today we spent the day in Old Jerusalem.

But once again, I owe you some videos from Tuesday night’s Light/Sound Extravaganza. I don’t remember exactly what time frame the first one is from, but I think it was when the Muslims took control of Jerusalem.

This one is the destruction of the 2nd Jewish Temple around 75AD.

Again, not sure where in the timeline this one falls.

This one is near the end of the show when they moved forward in time to modern Israel.

And finally, this was the last couple minutes of the show.

Yesterday, we started at Mount of Olives above the old city. The view was spectacular and the spot most of the famous pictures of Jerusalem are taken.

We took a group photo with the city in the background. Everyone actually looks great in it, so we bought a copy to bring home. Then it was on to Church of All Nations also known as the Church of the Agony. It is a Roman Catholic Church also on the Mount of Olives next to the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus prayed before being arrested.

On the other side of the street, is a view of the eastern part of the city wall that contains the Golden Gate, the only gate on the eastern side of the old city. The gate has been sealed since the Middle Ages, but its interior can be accessed from the Temple Mount. In Jewish tradition, the Messiah will enter Jerusalem through this gate, coming from the Mount of Olives. Both Christians and Muslims believe that this was the gate through which Jesus entered Jerusalem.

Once across the street (not easy as the traffic was insane), we walked past the Garden of Gethsemane to get to the entrance of the church, I was surprised at how small the garden is. Of course, some of it was taken down to build the church but even if you double the size, it’s still quite small. It is very dense with olive trees that are some of the oldest in the world, including what’s known as the Jesus tree. According to legend, Jesus planted this tree himself just a few days before his crucifixion. If that’s true, this tree is almost 2,000 years old. Just thinking about that is eerie.

The church is relatively small but very ornately decorated.

The most important part of this church is the rock where Jesus is said to have prayed before his arrest. The part of the rock that is inside the church is in front of the altar. Since they were celebrating Mass, we weren’t able to get close to it.

We did, though, get to touch the rock from the outside. Only one piece of it is inside the church, the rest extend under the church and ends outside.

Then it was back on the bus for the journey inside the old city. On the way, I managed to grab a quick shot of the Church of All Nations and the Church of Mary Magdalene, an Orthodox Christian Church. Considering the bus was moving fairly quickly, it’s not a bad shot.

The streets are very narrow so there are no cars or busses allowed inside the walls. Since we were going to be there for several hours and had a lot of ground to cover, we took the wheelchair, but it was not easy going. Peter walked some of the way, but other times I had help getting him down ramps and over the bumpy cobblestones.

The first stop inside the wall was the Western Wall, also known as the Wailing Wall. It is made of limestone and runs, beginning to end, about almost 1/2 mile, but the part everyone visits is relatively short. It was built as part of the expansion of the Second Jewish Temple in 19BC. Back in ancient times, ground level was 30 feet lower, so the wall was pretty high.

We had to go through security to get to the wall, then Peter and I separated as men and women each have their own section of the wall. So, one of the guys took Peter while I went with the girls to our part. Peter and I had written several prayer wishes in the hotel. The women’s side is always crowded so it took a while for my turn, but I found a small niche to place our wishes and said my prayer. Adoria managed to grab a picture of me at the wall.

This was a much more emotional experience than I expected, and I shared quite a few hugs and tears with my new friends. Then it was on our way to our last site, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which contains two of the holiest sites in Christianity – the site of Jesus’ crucifixion and his empty tomb. It was a bit of a hike but for part of it we walked the Via Dolorosa, the path that Jesus walked on his way to the crucifixion.

Station 5 is where, as Jesus stumbled, he put his hand on the wall to steady himself. For hundreds of years, Pilgrams have traveled here to touch the wall at that spot. Here’s Peter doing the same.

As I said the streets of the old town are crazy crowded and lined with shops, so it was very difficult to maneuver through them, especially with the wheelchair.

But, with lots of help, we finally made it to the church.

Because of the many flights of narrow, winding stairways we didn’t go up to Golgotha (Calvary), the site of the crucifixion. Instead, we stayed on the ground level near the stone where Jesus was anointed with oil after death. Our friend, Peggy, brought us some of the holy oil she picked up at Golgotha that we spread on our hands.

While we waited for everyone to come down from Golgotha, we saw the slab on which Jesus had been cleaned and anointed with oil before burial.

Another important site in the church is the spot where Mary fell when she fainted after seeing the body of her son.

There was a beautiful mosaic on the wall near the anointing slab.

In addition to these sites, the final holy site in the church is the empty tomb of Jesus. This was in another section of the church and had a 90/120-minute line to see/touch. We were so fortunate to have Tzachi as our tour director as he seems to know everyone in Israel, at least at the sites he brings his tours. So, he talked to the priest who was guarding the part of the slab that held Jesus’ head and we were able to visit there instead. Everyone in the long line was going to the other side of the tomb, where his body and feet lay. Of course, no photos were allowed, and Peter couldn’t bend down far enough to touch the stone himself, but I touched it then rubbed his forehead. Once again, it was incredibly moving.

Then it was back outside for the walk to the restaurant we were having lunch. Peter stuck with his hamburger, but at Adoria’s urging, I had a chicken shawarma, a typical Middle Eastern dish. The chicken is cooked on a spit in the same manner lamb is cooked for a gyro sandwich. It is put into a pita and stuffed with veggies and special sauces. It was my first and was very delicious.

She also had a side of falafel, which I took a pass on as I don’t like chickpeas.

Finally, we had about 30 minutes to shop in the market around the only fountain in Jerusalem. There wasn’t any water in it, but it was a good meeting place for everyone to gather.

We didn’t buy anything in the market, but it was fun place to browse. Then it was back to the bus for the short ride home. It was a terrific day!

In addition to a bad internet connection, the other reason I didn’t finish this post last night is that about 9:30, I got sicker than a dog. We had a delicious going away dinner with our group but then about 2 hours later I started feeling sick. I’ll spare you the gory details, but I think I had a touch of food poisoning. I’ve had it before, so the symptoms were quite familiar.

Needless to say, I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night between trips to the bathroom, so by this morning I felt pretty lousy. It’s now just after 10:30am on Thursday and I arranged for a noon checkout to give me a little more time to recover. I decided to finish the blog post as I need to get used to being upright instead of flat in bed. I don’t feel great, but I’m better than I was 6 hours ago.

What’s weird is that Peter and I had the same dinner last night, but he had no problems. About 9 of our group moved on to Jordan this morning and Adoria told me that one woman in that group was also up all night vomiting. So maybe, there was a bit of bacteria in the food. Nice way to say goodbye to Israel.

Final Reflections on Israel

I was so glad to see that all of my fears about a fully guided tour were unfounded. Tzachi is the best tour guide ever, our driver (Sunni) was amazing and the people in the group were incredible. Everyone was so helpful getting us around the city. I know we couldn’t have done this part of our Adventure on our own. I’m not sure how we’re going to manage in Greece and Istanbul now that we’re by ourselves again. I keep remembering all the steep hills in both cities and wonder how we’re going to navigate them with the wheelchair.

Until this year, I had never really thought about visiting the Holy Land but am so glad we did. I’m not religious, but I could hardly help being moved by the places we saw…the birthplace of Jesus, the site of his death and anointing and the tomb in which he was laid to rest. We sailed the Sea of Galilea and swam in the Dead Sea. How many people can say that? I could have lived without the food poisoning, but that did nothing to diminish the wonderful time we had. The best part is…we made new friends. I know that we won’t ever reach out to most of them, but I hope to keep in touch with a few.

Well, it’s time for me to get into the shower and finish packing for our taxi ride back to Tel Aviv. Wish me luck. The next time you hear from us we’ll be in Athens.

It’s 4:30AM on Wednesday and I’ve had my usual 6 hours of sleep, so I thought I’d get the post up about yesterday’s incredibly long, but wonderful, day. The internet connection here is so bad I’m unable to upload pictures or videos, so I’ve been doing that from the bus while on our drives. It literally only takes minutes instead of hours. And, on that note, I owe you a couple of pictures from Monday’s sites. The first is the entrance to the Tomb in the Garden, one of two possible sites of Jesus’ tomb.

The tomb was much smaller than I expected.

OK that finishes Monday. Yesterday started at 7am with a 90-minute drive to Masada, an ancient fortification on the southern end of Israel where, between 73-74AD, a group of over 900 Jewish people committed mass suicide rather than be taken as slaves by the Romans. To get there we drove through the Judean desert and followed the Dead Sea for much of the way.

Here’s a video I took from the bus. While we intellectually know that Israel is a modern country with modern cities, this is the Israel that was in our heads.

At one point we could see Jericho in the distance. Jericho is the oldest city in the world and, while it would have been fun to visit, it’s in Palestine and not on our itinerary. This is the area where we spotted a shepherd and his goats high on a hill and a man with his camel. The camel was just off the road, but we were moving too fast to snap a pic.

We followed the Dead Sea for about an hour, and it was quite beautiful with the sun shining on it.

The Dead Sea is the lowest point on earth at about 1200 feet below sea level. We actually felt our ears popping a bit as we went down. More on the lake later.

Once at Masada, we took a large cable car to the top of the tabletop shaped mountain.

We arrived around 8:30am but it was already in the 90s, so it was quite hot, even on top of the mountain. The pathway was sort of wheelchair accessible, but it took 3 of us to get Peter up the steep, uneven path.

Masada was actually a small city, with a palace built by King Herod the Great between 37-31BC. After about 20 minutes, we got to a spot with stairs so we parked the chair and Peter walked a little bit. After just a few minutes, though, it was clear that it wasn’t safe for him to walk so he perched on a rock while I went with the group to explore.

In the story of the mass suicide, 10 men were chosen to kill the rest of the residents and then drew lots to see who would remain alive to kill the other 9 and, finally, kill himself. Archeologists were very excited to find the actual lots that were used. We didn’t see them but here’s a picture that shows what they looked like.

The tour was going to take another 35-40 minutes and I didn’t want to leave Peter for that long (and besides after a while, all the remains start to look the same), so I left the group and headed back to Peter and Adoria. On the way, I stopped to take a video of the valley from one of the highest points in the city.

We managed to get back to the wheelchair and the entrance of the complex where we were able to sit in the shade and wait for the rest of the group. There was a nice cool breeze, so it was a wonderful place to wait. We were joined by a few other people from our group as they bailed out of the tour.

Then it was back down the mountain and into the bus for the short drive to the resort area of the Dead Sea. The lake is on the border of Israel (west side) and Jordan (east side) and is a big holiday destination for both Israelis and tourists from other countries. This section of the lake was filled with resort hotels and beaches, both private and public. We stopped at the mall for lunch (pasta and pizza…so sorry foodies, I’ve gotten out of the habit of taking food pictures; I promise to do better), then went to one of the public beaches for a swim in the lake.

The Dead Sea has 10 times the salt content of the oceans, so it is literally impossible not to float. We had been dragging our swimsuits around with us for the last 3 1/2 months, so it was great to finally put them to use.

Peter only stayed in the water for a short time as he had trouble keeping his feet under him. The water had a tendency to push you over as you were floating, and it was easy to lose your balance. Once I went flopped face first and the lower part of my face, up to my mouth, got into the water. My face burned for the next couple of hours. But it doesn’t hurt the skin of your body. We were warned, though, not to get any water in our eyes.

The mineral content of the water and mud of the lake are very good for the skin. Even after just a couple of minutes is the water my skin was much smoother. Tzachi had brought a couple bags of mud for us to use so most of us covered ourselves in goo.

Once covered, you let the mud dry, then head back into the water to wash it all off, which isn’t as easy as it sounds. My skin really did feel good when I was finally clean.

We played in the water for about an hour, then it was time to dry off and head back to the bus. Our short time on the beach was a ton of fun although the hotel may not be as happy, as we took our room towels and they’re now full of sand. Oh well.

It was just after 5pm when we got back to the hotel where we had a very short hour to get ready for our evening outing. It was dinner and a show that was an add-on to the tour. Dinner was at a restaurant in the city and while the food was good, it was nothing special. The restaurant, though, was beautiful.

Then it was back to the bus for a short drive to the Tower of David for the Light and Sound Show Spectacular. Through lights reflected on the wall of the fortress and sound, we saw the story of Israel from King David to modern times. It was incredible and, while expensive ($117 each), we thoroughly enjoyed the show.

Here are a couple of still photos but they don’t do the show justice. I took some videos but no way they upload on this internet, so I hope to be able to get them uploaded from the bus and I’ll post them with today’s update.

It was after 9pm before we made it back to the hotel, so it was a long, 14-hour, day but we had a great time. Today, on the last full day of the tour, we are visiting Old Jerusalem. So, I’ve got to get ready. I don’t even have time to proofread this, so apologies for typos or sentences that just don’t make sense. Talk later.

Today was another packed day. We’re not used to doing so much in one day as, up until this tour, we’ve pretty much taken it easy. But the good news is that we’re not doing anything but climbing in and out of the bus and going where Tazchi tells us to go.

The day started at a few museums. Our first stop was at a 1:50 model of the old city of Jerusalem at the time of the 2nd temple (about 70AD). It’s made of Jerusalem limestone and was very impressive.

The next stop was at an adjacent museum where we saw the dead sea scrolls. The story of finding these ancient documents is very similar to how the Lascaux caves were found. In 1946, a Bedouin shepherd boy reached into a large opening in a rock where his young goat had disappeared. The boy pulled out a jug which he gave to his father who opened the jug and found the scrolls. Long story short, the jug eventually made it into the hands of people who understood what it contained, and the rest is history. Eventually, several other jugs were found in 12 different caves. The scrolls date back to 3rd century BC to 1st century AD. No photographs were allowed but here’s one I found online.

Then it was off to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum on the Mount of Remembrance. The first part we saw was the Garden of the Righteous Among Nations dedicated to non-Jews who saved even one Jew from the Nazis.

Every person or group who assisted Jews in the Holocaust, has had a carob tree planted in this garden. When the Garden was dedicated in 1996, over 14000 Righteous had been honored. There aren’t that many trees as some of the trees are planted in honor of groups, like the Danish Resistance, who, in 1943, transported over 7200 Jews to Sweden. Two of the most well-known Righteous are Raoul Wallenberg and Oskar Schindler.

The next part of the museum we visited was the Children’s Memorial in remembrance of the 1.5 million children who were murdered by the Nazis. At the entrance of the underground cavern where the Memorial is located, is a sculpture of pillars broken at various heights. They symbolize the lives cut short by the Holocaust.

In the first room of the Memorial was a wall of photos of children who were murdered.

The main room of the Memorial is completely mirrored and reflects the light of five candles, so it looks like there are a candle for each child. As we walked through the dark room, names of the deceased children and adolescents, with their age and place of death, were recited by a looped tape recording. The recording takes about three months to list all the casualties. It was an incredibly moving experience.

Just outside the Memorial is a statue of Janusz Korczak, the head of a Polish orphanage. In 1942, he was exterminated in Treblinka Death Camp with his orphans because he refused to let them leave without him.

The final stop was the main museum which gives the history of anti-Semitism and tells the story of the Holocaust. It was very well done but due to the crowds and lack of time, we only did a quick walk through. We could have easily spent 2-3 hours, but we only had about 40 minutes.

I took these pictures before I realized that photographs weren’t allowed. The first exhibit told the story of over 2,000 Jews in Estonia were murdered as the Nazis were fleeing the advancing Soviet Army. They didn’t have time to burn all the bodies, so the Soviets found papers, pictures, and other personal effects on the bodies of the victims.

The complex was very interesting and well-worth the visit. After a quick lunch in the museum cafeteria, it was back on the bus for the short drive to our next stop, Mount Zion and the room where the Last Supper was held. There is some doubt among scholars that this is the actual place where Jesus had his last meal, but it is considered to be one of the holiest sites.

During the bus ride it started pouring rain and, while it slowed a little before we got off the bus, it was still too wet for Peter, so he stayed on the bus. I’m so glad he did because the pavement was way too bumpy for the wheelchair, and it was too slippery for him to walk. Besides, we were moving very quickly to try and get out of the rain, and he would have never been able to keep up.

There were a couple of beautiful glass windows.

This room is located on the upper floor of the building that also houses the Tomb of King David, of David/Goliath fame. He reigned between 1010 and 970BC. This was the only time that we were separated by gender to see a site. The men were given paper yarmulkes and went to the right to view one end of the tomb, while the women went to the left to view the other end.

Here’s a picture of the entire building.

The next picture is of Zion’s Gate in the wall. You can clearly see the bullet holes from one of the battles between Israel and Jordan during the Six Day war in 1967.

Our final stop for the day was only a mile away from the Tomb of King David but it took almost 45 minutes to get there. The traffic was ridiculous! Once again, Peter stayed on the bus while the rest of us visited what some scholars believe is the site of Calvary where Jesus was crucified. Our local guide gave a convincing presentation of why this is the site, but other scholars believe the actual site is at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, which we will visit on Wednesday. So, no matter which one is the actual site, we have our bases covered.

The site isn’t terribly impressive as it’s actually a parking lot.

Then a short walk from here was the site of what Stuart, and a bunch of other people, believe to be the tomb of Jesus. Again, he listed all the reasons why this is the original site.

I’ve been trying for 20 minutes to get the last 2 pictures to upload but it isn’t happening and I’m very tired. So, I’ll include them at the beginning to tomorrow’s post. Thanks for understanding. Talk with you soon.

Today (Sunday) was another long day. We checked out of the hotel in Haifa after breakfast and headed to the bus. The first stop was only 10 minutes away… the Baha’i Gardens. We saw it from the bus when we arrived on Friday. It was beautiful with all the lights, but it’s actually prettier in the daylight. This time we saw it from above.

After the panoramic view, we drove to the middle terrace where you could actually go into the Shrine. We didn’t go as shoes had to come off and Peter just didn’t want to mess with it. We waited in the garden, which was beautiful.

After we were finished at the Shrine, we headed to the Trappist Monastery of Latrun. Unfortunately, I can’t tell you why. Because it was Sunday, the church was closed as the monks are in prayer all day. We sat in a garden that wasn’t that pretty while Tzachi told us about the monks. It was interesting but we could have heard that while on the bus. Peter said the reason we went was because it was on the list. I think he’s right.

The next stop was also a little underwhelming, a field where David may have killed Goliath. Historians know that the incident occurred somewhere in the vicinity, but no one is exactly sure where. We picked up a souvenir stone and got back on the bus.

After a stop for lunch, we got to the main attraction of the day, the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. The church is the oldest church in the Holy Land (built in 4th century) as it’s never been destroyed by war, unlike other churches in the region.

The grotto in the basement of the church holds special significance in Christianity as all scholars agree that it the birthplace of Christ. It’s a very simple church on the outside but, from the little I saw, quite ornate on the inside.

This photo shows you the only part of the church we saw, other than the actual grotto. Everyplace we have visited in the Holy Land has been crazy crowded, but this was insanity. There were literally, thousands of people waiting in line to see to the grotto. Luckily, Peter and I were taken to a spot near the exit of the grotto to wait for our group to get to move through the line. He sat in his wheelchair, and I sat on a stone wall. That’s when I snuck in the exit door to get the picture.

While we were waiting, I went out to the courtyard to get a few pics. The statue is of St. Hieronymus, a 4th century theologian known for translating the bible from the original Hebrew to several other languages.

After waiting a little over 2 hours, the guard finally came to get us for our visit to the grotto. There were about 10 stone stairs into the grotto that were very scary for Peter. There was nothing for him to hold on to and the stairs were uneven and steep. With the guard’s help we were able to get him into the grotto where we were told to sit on the stone bench and wait about another 20 minutes for our group.

Inside the grotto was organized chaos. People had waited hours to get in and the guards were rushing them through in about 60 seconds. Here’s a short video that shows what it was like.

The actual birthplace of Jesus is what looks like a hole in the floor (it wasn’t, it was actually a 2–3-inch indentation in the floor) in the center of the star.

There was another small section of the grotto that held the manger. It was so dark, that it was really difficult to actually see anything.

On the way back to the bus I asked a woman in the group if she thought the grotto visit was worth the miserable 2-hour wait in line. She said she would have waited all day. I’ve very glad we saw it but I’m even more glad that we were comfortable during the wait.

Our last stop of the day (by this time it was night), was a store that specializes in products made of olive tree wood. They have lots of other things as well including silver and gold carvings and jewelry, but their main focus are the wood products. Peter stayed on the bus while I did a little shopping. I picked up a few things but didn’t do too much damage to the wallet.

It took about 20 minutes to get back across the border out of the West Bank, but once we did, we were only about 15 minutes away from the hotel. We have a large room with a walk-in shower. Tzachi called them this morning to tell them of our special needs and they kindly accommodated us. Of course, the shower doors only open a little way as they are blocked by the toilet and the toilet paper holder, but at least it’s not a tub.

Now it’s almost midnight (internet connection is terrible and it took FOREVER to upload the 27 second video) and I’m exhausted. So, it’s good night from Jerusalem.

Today was a much shorter, but still wonderful, day. We started with a 45-minute drive from Haifa to Cana, where Jesus performed his first miracle. In the Gospel account, Jesus, his mother and his disciples are invited to a wedding. When his mother notices that the wine has run out, she urges Jesus to do something about it. After much encouragement, he turned the water into wine. While there is some debate among scholars as to the location of the church, the most commonly held belief is that it was at the Wedding Church of Cana we visited today.

The church is now a Franciscan Catholic Church. We were able to go inside but there was a service going on, so we only got as far as the front door. It is a small church, but still very pretty.

We also saw a replica of the jug that held the water/wine. Each of these jugs could hold enough liquid for 80 people and there were 6 jugs. So, the wedding attendees had quite the open bar.

In the basement, there were ruins of the original church where the wedding was held.

Then it was on to Nazareth, where Jesus spent his youth. During Jesus’ time, only 125 families lived in the city. Now there is a population of 80,000 and the traffic to go with it. More than 74% of Israeli citizens are Jewish, almost 18% are Muslim and another 2% are Christian. The remaining citizens are from a wide variety of religions. There is, though, no Jewish presence in Nazareth. 70% of the inhabitants are Arab Muslims and the rest are Christian.

Our first stop in Nazareth was the site of the spring the inhabitants during Jesus’ time would have used. It was about 1/2 mile from where they lived. Why not live closer to the water? That’s what I asked. The answer is that the land was not suitable for habitation, so families lived in the caves and walked to get water, wash clothes, bathe, etc.

Mary’s Well is reputed to be located at the site where, according to the Greek Orthodox tradition, Angel Gabriel appeared to Mary and announced that she would bear the Son of God. This event known as the Annunciation.

Just behind this, is a Greek Orthodox church, behind which is the actual spring. There were literally hundreds of people there, so we didn’t even attempt to go down the stairs to see it.

The 1/2 mile walk to the caves where the Holy Family lived was difficult for us as it had bumpy cobblestones, steep hills, narrow sidewalks and a ton of traffic on the one-way streets. So, Peter ended up walking a fair amount of it while I had help with the wheelchair. Seriously, everyone on the tour has been amazingly helpful. I’m so grateful for them.

We finally arrived at the Basilica of the Annunciation, which holds the cave where Mary lived. According to Catholic tradition, this is where the Annunciation occurred, not Mary’s Well. But since we visited both sites, we have all our bases covered.

The original church was built in 570AD. The second church was built in the time of the crusades, about 1100. The 3rd church, the one here, was constructed in 1954.

Due to the number of spiral stairs we would have had to climb, we didn’t visit the upper church. Had we gone, we would have seen the cave that the Holy Family lived in while Jesus was growing up. Here’s a pic I found on Wikipedia.

We were on our own for lunch, which we ate very quickly as it took forever for our order to be delivered, then it was back to the bus for the hour drive to Caesarea National Park where the remains of the ancient city of Caesarea Palestinea are located. Tazchi said the tour would take 75-90 minutes and we really weren’t interested enough to do the entire tour. We’ve seen so many ruins and after a while, they all start to look alike. We did the first 30 minutes to see the amphitheater and palace.

After seeing the palace, Peter and I peeled off with a couple of others and headed for Golda’s Gelato shop Peter spotted when we got off the bus. Rachel had never had gelato before, so she enjoyed some with us.

It was a much shorter ride home tonight, so we were back in our room by 5:15. We just got back from dinner and as soon as I finish this, I’ll be relaxing for a while before heading to bed. We check out of the hotel and spend the last 4 nights of the tour in Jerusalem. Tomorrow, we spend a good part of the day in Bethlehem, which is in the West Bank of Palestine. It’s still part of Israel but is controlled by the Palestinians. It should be interesting.

So far, all my fears about a guided tour are unfounded. We don’t have to wear name badges, stickers or any other identifying thing (I saw one group yesterday wearing yellow kerchiefs around their necks…. not in this lifetime!!), and we’ve not had to wait for anyone to get back to the bus. Our tour director, Tazchi, is wonderful and the other people in our group (there are 24 of us) are amazing. They’ve all been so helpful getting Peter where he needs to be. We’re using the wheelchair as much as possible and everyone has been great helping us up/down any stairs and ramps.

Our day started only about 20 minutes from our hotel when we visited Jaffa, the ancient port city. The official name of the city is actually Tel Aviv-Jaffa. The picture below is a sculpture of the whale that swallowed Jonah. According to the bible, God asked Jonah to go to Nineveh and tell the people that they had sinned. Johah refused and boarded a ship in Jaffa instead. There was a violent storm and Jonah, realizing this was his punishment for disobedience, asked to be thrown into the sea where he was swallowed by the whale.

There were quite a few stairs getting down to the old port, but one of the guys carried the wheelchair while I helped Peter down.

In the picture below, there’s a small rock with an Israeli flag. The backstory on this was something about a dad being punished for saying his daughter was the most beautiful woman and some god not being happy with it, so the god tied the daughter to the rock. Now ships avoid the rock or bad things happen. So sorry I don’t remember all the details, but Tazchi has so many interesting stories it’s a bit hard to keep them straight.

Then we had about an hour drive to our next stop…the Sea of Galilee. Did you know that the lake’s official name is Kinneret? It’s also called Lake Tiberias and is about 8 miles wide and 12 miles long. We stopped at a beautiful overlook which was at sea level. As you can see from the video, the lake is much lower. We could see the Golan Heights and Jordan on the other side. Here’s a short video.

From here we went to the river Jordan where Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist. The site was crazy crowded, in fact, everywhere we went had dozens of tour buses in the parking lot.

This bible verse was on tiles throughout the site in every language imaginable.

We had the option of having a full immersion baptism but that would have been too difficult for us, so we stuck with wading mid-calf deep. The water was chilly, but we got used to it very quickly.

Some people were actually swimming in the river.

We stayed just long enough for a dip in the river, to quickly browse the gift shop (didn’t buy anything) and for Peter to get his daily ice cream, then headed back to the bus for a short drive to lunch. This was also crazy crowded as I think every tour bus in Israel was there at the same time. Lunches are not included in the tour, and I think this is the only time we’ll be in a large group for lunch. Hopefully, we’ll be able to find something more to our liking and less expensive.

After lunch our first stop was the Mount of Beatitudes, where Jesus gave his sermon on the mount.

Our final sightseeing stop was the home of Simon Peter at Capernaum. Jesus lived here with him for a year, healing Peter’s mother-in-law. By this time Peter was exhausted so he waited in the bus while I visited the site, which is in ruins but very interesting.

There are also the remains of two ancient synagogues, one built on top of the other. The lower most structure was from the time of Jesus, the other was built about 200 years later.

We still had one more thing to do before getting to our new hotel. We took a cruise across the Sea of Galilee in a boat reminiscent of the type that might have been used in the time of Jesus. For this, we merged with our “twin” tour, the 2nd Globus tour that has the exact itinerary. We had met a few people from that group the night before.

The cruise was about an hour an hour and lots of fun. I danced to Hava Nagila, and we both got a shirt that says, “I’ve sailed on the Sea of Galilee”. Actually, it was more an opportunity to get another clean shirt than really wanting the souvenir, but it is pretty cool.

Once back in the bus, the drive to our new hotel in Haifa was over 90 minutes and by this time we were exhausted. The route was bumpy and very curvy, so Peter was actually feeling a little sick during the last 45 minutes of the trip.

When we finally got to the hotel, it was almost 8pm and we’d been on the go for 12 hours. I took him straight to our room and left him to rest while I grabbed dinner. Then I arranged for us to switch our room to an accessible room as our bathroom once again had a tub shower, which he can’t use. He wasn’t able to shower in Tel Aviv, so we needed something easier, and safer, for him to use. I’ll talk with Tazchi today about arranging for an accessible room in Jerusalem.

By the time we changed rooms and get settled it was almost 10pm, so I hope you can understand why I didn’t post last night. Now, it’s after 6:30 Saturday morning and I have to get ready for today. Where are we going? I have no idea, but I’m sure it will be fun. Gotta go. Love to all.

After 5 cold, rainy days, it was absolutely gorgeous today in Tel Aviv, low 70s and sunny. We started the day with an interesting breakfast buffet in the hotel. It’s advertised as a full Jewish breakfast. Not being Jewish, we had no idea what that meant. Well, if our breakfast today is an indication, it means everything you can possibly want to eat and then some. There was a salad bar, fresh fruit, dried fruit, chicken, pasta, pizza, cereal, desserts, quiche and a bunch of food that I couldn’t identify. In fact, there was so much, I had a hard time finding the actual breakfast food. I finally saw a woman making eggs to order so we both had an omelet that was good, but very different looking from what we’re used to. Instead of items being folded into the egg, everything was laid on top. It will take a day or two, but we will probably go through a “ham withdrawal” phase. As you may have noticed, we eat a lot of ham. Well, not in Israel. Not sure how we will survive.

After breakfast, we went for a walk on the promenade, which is 14 km long (about 8 miles).

Of course, we only went a short way but far enough to find Golda’s Gelato shop. It’s been several weeks since we had gelato and we were long overdue. It’s hard to get excited about ice cream while wrapped in a scarf, wearing gloves and dodging raindrops.

There are about 8 beach volleyball courts that were filled when we got up this morning at 6am. There were there when we went to bed at 10pm last night. Don’t they work??

After our short walk, I got a 45-minute massage, mostly back and neck. I tweaked my neck a few days ago and it’s been killing me ever since. My massage therapist, Doran, has magic hands. He spent a ton of time on my upper back before even touching my neck. The neck is still sore but is much better than it was. We’ll have some downtime in Greece, so I may get another one there. That should keep me going until I get home and can get an appointment with my usual massage therapist.

Then later this afternoon, we took a free 2-hour tour of Tel Aviv. Did you know that Tel Aviv is not the capital of Israel, Jerusalem is. Jerusalem also has twice the population, 1 million to Tel Aviv’s half million. Who knew??

Actually, the tour lasted about 30 minutes on the way to the Diamond Center, which was the sponsor of the tour. Once there, their goal was to sell us diamonds. It was just 3 of us, me, Peter and our new friend Robin who we met last night. After getting the ring in Antwerp (which was a much better deal) all I did was have fun trying on more rings. Robin almost bought a ring but decided against at the last minute. We met two more couples who are going to be in our group who were also shopping. Well, at least the women were shopping. They guys were sitting along the wall hoping for the best.

We have our first group meeting tonight at dinner. That’s when we’ll meet the rest of the group and, I assume, our tour leader. We leave Tel Aviv tomorrow and have a packed day of sightseeing. We’re really looking forward to sharing it with you.

This is going to be short as it’s been a long day and I’m very tired. Flying on ElAl was a flash back to the early days after 9/11. The only armed security (automatic weapon armed) we saw at the airport was at the ElAl check in counter. We were screened 3 times before being allowed on the plane. I packed my IPAD that we use for music in the car into the checked luggage. We got pulled aside and asked what it was, how long did I have it, what color was it. I totally understand their caution. Israel is a small nation surrounded by countries that want to see them wiped off the face of the earth. So, if going through extra security is what it takes to keep us safe, we’re ok with that. It was just a startling to see it.

Once on the plane, we had an uneventful 4 1/2-hour flight. Luckily, we had a wheelchair escort get us through immigrations when we arrived, or we’d still be in line. Our driver was waiting for us, and just under an hour later we checked into our hotel. It’s right on the beach and we’re looking forward to seeing it in the daylight as by the time we got here it was almost 6pm and dark.

This pic is from our balcony.

We’ve already met a woman from our tour. She’s a solo traveler and just arrived today from North Carolina. She was pretty exhausted, so we only chatted for a couple of minutes. She seems very nice, though, so it will be fun to get to know her.

Dinner was at a restaurant a short walk from the hotel. It was chicken for me today. It was very tender and quite good.

I don’t know what we’re going to do tomorrow, as the tour doesn’t start until dinner. There doesn’t seem to be much to see in Tel Aviv but I’m sure we’ll find something to do. Going to bed….Shalom.