Last week Phil came to see me, and in recognition of my dwindling funds and time available for travel, we took a big road trip to the Dead Sea area and the Syrian lands of Israel, the Golan Heights, hiking around mountains and oases.



Our first stop, after a romantic yet sleepy evening in Tel AvivJordan, but the wind wasn't good that day :-) Woke up with the sun in the morning and took a looooong walk to find the best mud pool. As always, the Dead Sea was an enchanting place. The geography, the salt formations (or perhaps salt "growths" is a better description), the absence of life, the alien water properties, the extreme weather--all of this makes you feel like you're in a dream world or on some hallucinogenic. and a brief tour of Yaffo, was a beach on the Dead Sea. We tried our best to float to

We finally found our mud pool and covered our bodies in the healing minerals. Check out these mud monsters!!!

This is the mud drying on my back. In an hour I turned from mud monster to elephant woman.

After we had our fill of the sea, we hitched a ride to Ein Gedi, an oasis and Kibbutz nearby. A nice hike through cold fresh water streams and up rocky mountains to reach this hidden waterfall. Beautiful. All was well until a bird pooped on me and we missed our bus back to Be'er Sheva--or I should say, the bus never came. A long roundabout journey home, including not a homemade dinner but bus cafeteria pizza put us in a real sour mood.

Wednesday we made our way north on a nice and easy train, eager to pick up our rental car and no longer have to rely on the unusually unreliable public transportation (other bad luck included lost baggage, a taxi from the airport to Jerusalem, and sudden bronchial irritation which left me voiceless and a mess!)

Arriving late to the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee) we decided to camp at a cheap beach campground, which ended up being the worst decision we could ever make. "Arsim" dominated the site, drunk and loving their terrible techno blasting out of huge speakers all night long with intermittent Karaoke breaks. Phil was SO upset, especially when they ignored his well reasoned and kind requests to turn the system down (I was drugged up with nighttime cough medicine).

The night from hell on the beautiful lake was soon over and we made our way to Yedudiya Nature Reserve.

Rolling hills and mountains with canyons hiding pockets of tropical wildlife, waterfalls cascading down cliff tops into dazzling pools of clear water--living in the desert makes it easy to see Israel's water problem, but up in the Golan it's water, water everywhere!

On our first hike we saw a "hexagon pools" where the rocks were formed into strange, smooth geometric shapes from slowly cooling lava millions of years ago. Here is a picture of Phil diving off of one, though the signs clear said DANGER DONT! I shook my head, taking this picture in case it was the last I'd see of him, but he made out alive.

Chillin' (or baking, I suppose) at our own private waterfall.

On a car tour around the Kinneret at sunset. Pictured here you can see the four "fingers" created from the rivers that run to the Kinneret and Jordan River.

Hike # two at Yehudiya was doubly amazing, though less private- the trail was crowded with young Israeli hikers. A steep hike down to the Yehudiya stream, passing by the remains of the ancient Syrian village of Yehudiya, to another waterfall and then further, jumping from ladders into icy pools to make our way along the stream.

















































Later that day we packed up and headed even further north, to a mountaintop overlooking Syria and snow topped Mt. Herman. From the cozy Coffee Annan café (pronounced “Kofi Annan” hehe), we sipped "slush coffees" and marveled at the scenery. The mountaintop was the site of an old Syrian bunker which I think was overtaken by the Israelis in the wars over the area. It was really neat to be able to go down into the bunker and see where the soldiers slept and spied on the countryside. We could also see the demilitarized zone and the UN buildings. Though there wasn't as much difference in landscape between Syria and Israel as I had imagined, there was a clear break from the sprawling Israeli farmland.




Here is a view from inside the mountain:

and this is the entrance deeper into the underground army bunker:

This is where my camera ran out of batteries, unfortunately. Our next task was finding a campground, which proved difficult on one of the busiest Jewish holiday weekends. Luckily we stumbled across a "Deer Forest," a campground-come- petting zoo, filled with families and fun animals to meet--the perfect place to rest, especially with the horrid techno night still playing in the back of our minds. Phil took me to a great Lebanese restaurant he remembered from his time spent in Israel in 2006. The building sat on top of a rushing stream, like a cross between the Cove in Leland and something Frank Lloyd Wright would dream up... It was so beautiful and relaxing! we had a feast of lamb kebab, falafel, hummus, labne (yogurt cheese), tabulli, and lemonada (lemonade and fresh mint).

The next day we visited all the animals and headed to Banias Waterfall, the tallest waterfall in Israel, and then drove to the mystical mountain town of Tsfat, a center of Kabbalah. Though it was Shabbat, and most things were closed, we managed to see some art galleries that took over the old Arab quarter of the town. The town was cleanly divided by the British due to rioting in 1948 into Arab and Jewish sides separated by a wide set of stairs lit by a large spotlight. After the Arabs fled Tsfat, their side was converted into a sort of Artists' colony, where artists taken by the powerful mixture of natural beauty and concentrated spirituality made permanent residence.

Unfortunately, we were both so worn out from the week and the heat that we didn't enjoy our time in Tsfat like we could have. *next time* I'm sure we'll take some classes on Jewish mysticism and visit the synagogues and haunting cemeteries, as planned. Instead we knapped at a guest house and watched the sunset with the locals, waiting for the first three stars to appear, signifying the end of Shabbat, the holy day of the week. As dusk fell, all around us people burst into song, singing the prayers which separate the holy time and space from the rest of the week. It was very powerful, at least for me, because Phil was leaving the next day. In a way, the week was a holy, separate time and space for us, and the prayer at nightfall signified the physical separation which would occur in a matter of hours.

Two milkshakes and a stroll through the now lively cobblestone streets later, we slept soundly in our mountain bed, followed by a semi frantic trip to the airport involving a detour through the tangled streets of downtown Haifa with the gas light on and a nice coastal drive. I miss him already!!! More pictures will be available on Facebook soon.