My alarm and three other alarms in my room went off at 6:00 in the morning. We all wanted to make sure that we would be able to wake up for our trip. We quickly got ready and got to the buses by 7:00. The bus ride was short so we didn't get much time to nap. We arrived by a very interesting spring. This is a natural spring that had an enclosure built around it. The water in this spring would fill up this very tall tub-like structure and then trickle back down into the ground. We were lucky to be able to see this phenomenon in the early morning. We also ate breakfast here, although in my opinion, it was more like a snack. We got chocolate milk, rugelach, and a challah roll for breakfast. Not very filling, but somehow we survived.
After breakfast, we began to hike. We were originally told that it would be something of a nice walk, but we later realized that it was much harder than the hike we did in the Negev. We had to climb up and down mountains, go through caves, tunnels and forests, and cross rivers by stepping on the smallest of stepping stones without falling in, all of this without getting lost. It sounds a bit crazy and exaggerated, but we actually did it. Yes, people did slip into the rivers but they were barely ankle deep so it was okay. Yes, people also got a bit lost in the middle of the desert/ forest. We were a large group, I was at the front, of course, and our tour guide walked pretty fast and didn't really take any breaks. There was one point when about twenty of us were together at the front with the hiking guide and we didn't see the rest of the group behind us, so we stopped and waited about a half hour while the tour guide went to go look for them. There was one point towards the end where there was a big pool of water, so a few of us decided to go dip our feet in. It was shallow so we didn't get too wet and there were little fish swimming all around our feet. The rest of our group who was watching us started to try to convince us to go all the way in and go swimming. Nobody really wanted to at first but then I decided to go in. It was really nice and refreshing even though it was also kinda freezing. Our hike ended about 15 minutes later at a very pretty picnic spot. It was lunch time so a few of us volunteered to go get lunch from the buses. There was no road near the picnic spot, so we had to walk for a few minutes to go get the stuff. Lunch was these really cool professionally packed sandwiches. There were a bunch of different kinds of sandwiches and those of us who went to get it got first dibs which was especially good because we didn't have to fight when the rest of the Harova animals were attacking.
After lunch we got on the buses to drive to our next stop which was in Shiloh. This is the place where the tabernacle rested for 369 years. There is a small, but growing Jewish community there. At the beginning of our tour, we saw a Byzantine church which had a Jewish star painted on the floor. Before it became the symbol of Judaism, it was just another pretty geometric shape that made their church look nice. Later on in history, Christians began using the star to represent Jews. As we walked along, our tour guide told us that this was a great place for archaeology because the Israelites used to break their dishes when they were done using them to eat the holy sacrifice so shards of pottery were found everywhere. We also saw a stone structure that they dug up that they discovered to be a kitchen because they found jugs with charred olives and grapes. At the end of the tour, we saw the place where they estimated that the actual tabernacle stood.
Our last stop was in a winery but it had nothing to do with wine. It was actually a very interesting way to sum up the days events. First there was an interactive computer game that was trivia about Israel. Through this we got to learn interesting facts and also why the West Bank is essential to the survival of the State of Israel. We then saw a fictional movie about an Israeli who was moving to London and gets transported to past historical events. These events, along with a pretty Israeli girlfriend, convinced him to stay in Israel. It was a very long and exhausting, but fun day and I enjoyed it very much. Shalom V'lehitraot!
No comments:
Post a Comment