Food in Israel

I had an awesome time walking around Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. There is so much history in Jerusalem; I highly recommend taking a walk above it all along the ramparts around the Old Town. The Wailing Wall and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre are excellent places to see the importance of religion in people's lives. At the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, we saw many people weeping as they touched their garments on the Stone of Anointing.

Tel Aviv is very different; the city is very modern. It seemed like at every corner of Tel Aviv there was a new shop opening or building being built. It felt like most of the people in Tel Aviv were young and the city pulsed with an energy not found in other places. The beach is also clean and beautiful; I spent an afternoon just sitting on the rocks and people-watching.

Climbing in Ein Farah, Israel in the early morning

We took a day trip to climb some rocks in Ein Farah (about a 20 minute drive outside of Jerusalem through a couple of checkpoints) and had a picnic afterward in front of a cave. Google maps does not appear to know where this place is. On the trip there, our Israeli version of Tom Tom kept telling us we were above the speed limit but did not tell us to go under it. We went with a rock climbing guide who set up 3 routes of increasing difficulty; the hardest one had a middle section under an overhang. We then hiked a bit further into a park above some small springs. The springs were a great way to cool off in the hot sun and little fish pecked at our feet.