Golan Heights
Time to write down what little remains in my memory of my trip to the Golan Heights.
The buses left at probably around 5:50 in the morning last Friday, and my stupid alarm didn't wake me up until about 5:35. So I threw on clothes and hauled my bag out of the dorms, then slept in the bus seat until there was actual light outside. My hatred for early morning wake-up calls transcends all national borders and time zones.
Not much interesting happened until we got to the Sea of Galilee. Unfortunately, we didn't get to stop and walk around, or preferably swim, but it was a nice little lake. I don't care what the name says, seriously, it's a lake. We were driving by the Eastern shore, and you could easily see Tiberias on the other side. Plus it couldn't have been more than twenty minutes before we left it behind us.
If you have an idea of Israel's general shape, Golan is the area in the top right corner, above the Galilee. It shares borders with Syria and Lebanon, and during the winter months it's the greenest place in Israel. I'll have to go back in November to see it. We got off the buses to take a hike through Mappal Gil-Bon, a stream that flows down into the valley and the Jordan river. It was nice to see running water again. The guide and about ten of us waded through the stream while those who didn't want to get wet took other paths down the valley. That was by far the best part, since it was a cool little waist-deep stream with fig trees, bamboo-type plants and others forming a little canopy over us. We also sat in some basalt caves for a while and tried not to disturb the bats. One moron took a flash picture of them, but luckily they ignored him.
Once the hike was over we traveled farther up to a mountain area on the north-western border of Israel. Well, they were hills, really. What is it with landscape features in Israel being given bigger names than they merit? There's actually a real mountain even farther north, but every time the guide called the thing we were on a mountain I almost giggled. Anyway, this was a strategic spot in the Yom Kippur War, where Israeli tanks fought off large numbers of invading Syrian tanks trying to get through the low areas between the mountains. The whole area is strategic, because we were looking down into Syria from a mid-sized hill, and they don't have anything even close to that kind of vantage point on their side. We could see an Israeli military intelligence base situated on top of another nearby hill. We sat on an old tank that had been left there as a memorial while the guide told us about the Yom Kippur War (1973, I think).
After that we went even further north to a town called Tel-Hai, way in the Northern tip of Israel, where our hostel was. It was an extremely nice hostel, well-kept, pretty buildings and a backyard area with a large field and patio overlooking the valley. Once I'd gotten a shower and changed I went with my temporary roommates to the services which are held as the sun sets every Friday night, signaling the beginning of Shabbat. It was really amazing actually, to sit outside on the patio with warm wind and hearing the student-led hymns being sung (one guy wants to be a rabbi and so knows how to lead the songs), looking out at the sun setting behind the hills and the lights of the towns down in the valley.
Shabbat dinner was good.
My roommates and I slept until twelve in the afternoon, and apparently we weren't the only ones. A lot of people missed breakfast, but we managed to get up and leave the Olympic coverage for a few hours for lunch (it had been awhile since any of us had a TV). But then we came back and crashed for a little longer. There's a disturbing amount of table tennis on the Israeli coverage of the Olympics. Maybe there wasn't much else to cover at the time.
Since we couldn't leave until sundown (for Shomer-Shabbat observant students), I visited a photographic museum with a few other people, which was mildly interesting, came back, had dinner, and then packed to move out. Getting a group our size onto two buses is a serious operation, though, so we didn't get moving until at least 9:30. But we did get to watch Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade on the way back. :)
The buses left at probably around 5:50 in the morning last Friday, and my stupid alarm didn't wake me up until about 5:35. So I threw on clothes and hauled my bag out of the dorms, then slept in the bus seat until there was actual light outside. My hatred for early morning wake-up calls transcends all national borders and time zones.
Not much interesting happened until we got to the Sea of Galilee. Unfortunately, we didn't get to stop and walk around, or preferably swim, but it was a nice little lake. I don't care what the name says, seriously, it's a lake. We were driving by the Eastern shore, and you could easily see Tiberias on the other side. Plus it couldn't have been more than twenty minutes before we left it behind us.
If you have an idea of Israel's general shape, Golan is the area in the top right corner, above the Galilee. It shares borders with Syria and Lebanon, and during the winter months it's the greenest place in Israel. I'll have to go back in November to see it. We got off the buses to take a hike through Mappal Gil-Bon, a stream that flows down into the valley and the Jordan river. It was nice to see running water again. The guide and about ten of us waded through the stream while those who didn't want to get wet took other paths down the valley. That was by far the best part, since it was a cool little waist-deep stream with fig trees, bamboo-type plants and others forming a little canopy over us. We also sat in some basalt caves for a while and tried not to disturb the bats. One moron took a flash picture of them, but luckily they ignored him.
Once the hike was over we traveled farther up to a mountain area on the north-western border of Israel. Well, they were hills, really. What is it with landscape features in Israel being given bigger names than they merit? There's actually a real mountain even farther north, but every time the guide called the thing we were on a mountain I almost giggled. Anyway, this was a strategic spot in the Yom Kippur War, where Israeli tanks fought off large numbers of invading Syrian tanks trying to get through the low areas between the mountains. The whole area is strategic, because we were looking down into Syria from a mid-sized hill, and they don't have anything even close to that kind of vantage point on their side. We could see an Israeli military intelligence base situated on top of another nearby hill. We sat on an old tank that had been left there as a memorial while the guide told us about the Yom Kippur War (1973, I think).
After that we went even further north to a town called Tel-Hai, way in the Northern tip of Israel, where our hostel was. It was an extremely nice hostel, well-kept, pretty buildings and a backyard area with a large field and patio overlooking the valley. Once I'd gotten a shower and changed I went with my temporary roommates to the services which are held as the sun sets every Friday night, signaling the beginning of Shabbat. It was really amazing actually, to sit outside on the patio with warm wind and hearing the student-led hymns being sung (one guy wants to be a rabbi and so knows how to lead the songs), looking out at the sun setting behind the hills and the lights of the towns down in the valley.
Shabbat dinner was good.
My roommates and I slept until twelve in the afternoon, and apparently we weren't the only ones. A lot of people missed breakfast, but we managed to get up and leave the Olympic coverage for a few hours for lunch (it had been awhile since any of us had a TV). But then we came back and crashed for a little longer. There's a disturbing amount of table tennis on the Israeli coverage of the Olympics. Maybe there wasn't much else to cover at the time.
Since we couldn't leave until sundown (for Shomer-Shabbat observant students), I visited a photographic museum with a few other people, which was mildly interesting, came back, had dinner, and then packed to move out. Getting a group our size onto two buses is a serious operation, though, so we didn't get moving until at least 9:30. But we did get to watch Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade on the way back. :)
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