Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Israel in four days

Helen and I have been traveling for a few days already. We started at the Dead Sea, swimming there for all of 10 minutes until it burned too much to stay in any longer. We stayed at the youth hostel and there was only one other woman in our room but she spoke zero English and zero Hebrew. I think she spoke Korean but I couldn't be sure. The next morning, we took the cable car up to the top of Masada and spent about an hour there. Then we said good bye to the Dead Sea and drove to Jerusalem. After spending too much on parking (and driving in circles) and then finding the hostel parking, we made our way to the Old City and walked along the Via Dolorosa, which is the route Jesus is said to have taken when he was arrested and eventually crucified. We ended up at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and had to read through the guidebook a few times to understand the significance of everything. I still don't understand everything but that is ok. We spent the night at the Abraham Hostel, which is much more like the hostels I remember staying at while traveling in Australia and New Zealand. They had activities, a hang out area with a bar and a pool table, laundry (I love clean laundry so much!), and bigger rooms. We stayed in a 10 bed coed dorm and met one guy from Belgium who was not enthused with Egypt and one guy from California who is considering going to the Aish yeshiva but hadn't made up his mind. At the end of our "what are you doing in Israel?" script, he asked if he could ask a political question. Sure, why not? What do you think of the settlements? ... Um really? I said I didn't know enough too have an informed answer. Which is true. I don't know what he was expecting to hear. He was just out of college from UCLA so I don't know what he was going for. We left the hostel and drove around the Old City (no easy feat when street signs are not visible) and parked close to the Mount of Olives. I was terrified that the car was going to get broken into, but thankfully it did not. We went into the Church of the All Nations and then walked up the hill to see Jerusalem from above the cemetery there. It was breezy but warm and the view was nice. We drove quickly by the Garden Tomb and then headed out of Jerusalem to make our way north to Nazareth. Let me say that our GPS hasn't been the greatest help, but has gotten us at least to the somewhat right direction where I can find the correct signs to point us on our way.
We made it to Nazareth and of course the hostel we are staying at is not located on a street with a name so we drove in circles until we found some signs and parked. Then we checked in and had to move to car. I was completely stressed about damaging the car and having to pay for it but luckily we are okay. Found parking and saw a few churches here that were very cool. Even though we didn't do as much walking today as yesterday, we are both beat. Hopefully it won't be too hot and too noisy to sleep tonight.
Tomorrow we are going to explore Capernum and the Sea of Galilee before heading back to Tel Aviv. I am so excited about going to Greece on Thursday!

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