Masada is an ancient military fortification. It is at the top of a big hill and it is flattened out like a mesa. It is very isolated. King Herod built a huge complex on top. You would think that since it is so out of the way, and high up (300 feet on the shortest Read More …
My favorite day in Israel was when we went to Beit Guvrin Archaeological Park. It is about an hour outside of Jerusalem. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site that houses the ruins of the ancient city of Maresha. By the time we got here, I was feeling a little “ancient history-ed” out since we Read More …
One of the most fun things we did in Jerusalem was to take a tour of the tunnels by the Western Wall. Archaeologists have been working on these tunnels for decades and they have found all sort of artifacts from the first century C.E. If you go to Israel, I highly recommend this tour.
For a country that’s about the size of New Jersey, Israel has a huge amount of diversity landwise. It has desert in the south, by Eilat, it has beaches by Tel Aviv, and now, we are up in the hills and mountains in the north. Did you know you can snow ski in Israel? One Read More …
Wow. What a huge difference between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. I’ve never seen two places more opposite. Tel Aviv is modern, Jerusalem is ancient. Tel Aviv is secular, Jerusalem is intensely religious. Our guide Bruce said “Tel Aviv is an ugly city with a few beautiful areas, and Jerusalem is a beautiful city with a Read More …
Caesarea felt like time traveling. This coastal ruin had been inhabited for more than 3000 years. We started in the ruins where Herod built the city and the port in 25 B.C.E. As we moved north along the Mediterranean coast, we saw the Roman amphitheatre and the hippodrome from when the Roman Empire took over Read More …
We had a very busy time in Tel Aviv. It is a big city with almost 3.7 million people living in the area. That is almost half the population of the country. There were a few things that surprised me about Tel Aviv. The first thing was that even though the majority of the people Read More …
It’s kind of weird going over the border from Israel to Jordan. It’s even weirder coming back. We went to Jordan for 10 hours so we could visit Petra. On the way over, the Immigration / Border people are not very chatty. There were a number of people with guns there. This made me feel Read More …
Ravenna is famous for its mosaics. They were completed almost 2000 years ago. We went to the San Vitale church, which is supposed to have the most beautiful mosaics. When we looked inside, most of the walls other than the main altar were stone. The altar was done beautifully with gold and blue tiles, and Read More …
We wanted to go to Bosnia and Herzegovina. Sadly, our port was in Croatia, so to fix that problem, we drove for 2 hours to get to Bosnia. It was kind of strange to see so many buildings with giant bullet and bomb holes in them. The main thing we saw was the Mostar bridge. Read More …
