Last night we stayed up way too late- me reading and Katie working on her notes for her class. So we were dragging this morning. We get a wake up call between 6 and 6:30 every morning and it was tempting to skip breakfast and just get coffee as we were leaving the hotel. But we managed to make it down to the dining room and were greeted with the same breakfast we’ve had every morning. It’s amazing how you can have something that you normally really enjoy, but by day 5 of the same thing, you are ready to for some variety. Breakfast is cold meats and cheeses, hummus, several types of plain yogurt, sliced tomatoes and cucumbers, olives, pita bread, hard boiled eggs and scrambled eggs. Lunch is usually away from the hotel, but always very similar- pita and hummus, marinated vegetables (cabbage, carrots, beets, green beans and cucumbers) usually some grilled eggplant followed by some type of meat and French fries or rice. Then dinner is a more elaborate display of the same type of salads, pita and hummus, then either beef, chicken and fish with rice or potatoes and vegetables like green peas or carrots. The exception to this was yesterday – we had grilled whole St. Peter’s fish (tilapia) fresh from the Sea of Galilee (delicious, but very bony) and today, a wonderful lunch of barbecued chicken and a traditional Arabic rice/cauliflower dish (maqloubah), which was delicious. I hope Katie can deconstruct the maqloubah in her mind, then cook it for us when we get home. Hope I don’t sound like I’m complaining, just want you all to understand why we’re having cravings for some Fleur dis Lis!
Again we suited up for a cold, rainy day. We checked out of the hotel and started heading south back towards Jerusalem and Bethlehem. We went to Sepphoris, a town near Nazareth which had a rich history and is an archeologists dream. What they have uncovered so far is in remarkably good shape: mansion houses, theater, etc. and it gives a hint into the life of the peoples that lived in towns such as this one. The mosaics are beautiful and elaborate. It is the town where Jesus’ mother was from and where it is likely that Joseph worked, so Jesus probably spent a good bit of time there. The current and prevailing theory is that Joseph was a stone cutter, not an actual traditional carpenter of wood. Anyway, it was a fairly wealthy town and thought to be where Jesus developed some of his ideas of hypocrisy (theater) and money. We were able to walk around. Good bit of he site, but again we couldn’t see the entire sight due to rain and the amount of water that was collecting.
After lunch we went to the town of Nablus to the Greek Orthodox Church of St. Photini the Samaritan at Jacob’s Well. Jacobs Well is often considered the most authentic site in the Holy Land — since no one can move a well that was originally more than 120 feet deep.
Jacob’s Well was where Jesus asked a Samaritan woman for a drink and offered her “living water”. It lies in the crypt of a modern Greek Orthodox church at Nablus in the West Bank. The present church is modeled on a basilica from the Crusader era.
This is the childhood church of our guide Iyad. He is still very close to the priest at the church so has a deep love of and knowledge of the rebuilding of the church. The priest has done much of the “writing” of many of the beautiful icons and the dome in the church. {Katie: This church was absolutely outstanding. The church that is standing on that spot was just ruins until a few years ago. It had been built by the crusaders on top of the well but had been destroyed over the past few centuries and all that was standing were still a few columns and walls. The current abbot is Father Justinian and when he moved there from Greece as a young man, he had a vision of restoring the church before his death. He traveled the world raising money to rebuild and restore the church and completed it just a few years ago. He is an incredible artist and did all of the icons and mosaics himself. I really, really wish we could attach some pictures!}
After Nablus we were to go to a brewery in the mountains on the way back to Jerusalem, but by this time it was beginning to snow and our guide and the driver didn’t want to chance it being icy coming down. Good call, we thought.
We got back to the hotel and after shedding some layers of wet clothes we met in the hotel lobby with several bottles of wine that we had bought over the last few days. It’s been fun seeing (and buying) wine here. The names are great- Star of Bethlehem Chardonnay, Jesus Boat Sauvignon Blanc, Masada Dry White Wine, just to name a few!
Katie and I had all intentions of taking a taxi to venture out to a restaurant last night, but the hotel couldn’t even get a taxi to answer their phone. The snow was really coming down hard and I guess it was a sign that we weren’t to go out. We really weren’t hungry after such a great lunch, but had just wanted to walk around a different area of the town. It is very hilly here so we decided against walking and slipping and sliding, so we ended up eating a protein bar and going to bed early.
Mark and Freda's Wanderings 