Another crazy weekend up North

Me and four other people (Rebecca, Jared, and Seth are all from Boston, and Eli is from California) woke up at 6 in the morning on Friday and traveled allllll the way up north(three hours away). I've been there so many times now I have the route mastered. We started off in this really cute town ( I forgot what it's called..) and saw an ancient synagogue and went to a winery (we didn't try anything though because we were on a budget). Then we went to the grocery store to get food for our trip (canned beans,pees,corn,bread,penute butter, chocolate spread, water,mashed potatoes, and rice). Then we walked about a mile to the start of the hike in the mountain called Zahar Zavitan or something like that. We hiked for about 2 miles and then the sun started setting so we found a nice flat place to camp and quickly gathered fire wood because we had very little time before the darkness would creep in. Half an hour later, it was pitch black but we managed to cook rice, beans, and corn. Then we said kiddish!(over a bottle of rum) and went into some deep conversations...
Two of the boys I was with (Jared and Seth) are taking advantage of their time here more than anyone else. Every single day/night they explore and do something different; they don't waste any time here. They told me an analogy that went like this: Each of us have a sack this year, and you have to fill the sack with as many pebbles as possible and later on, those pebbles will turn into gold. Basically it means that you have to take in as many experiences as you can, even if they don't seam worthy or important at the time, because later in life all of those experiences will turn into something very valuable. They are hilarious, super funny guys. Every day they ask each other , "Seth, hows your sack doing today??"
All I could see while laying in my sleeping bag was the stars and the outline of the mountain surrounding me. In the near distance I heard coyotes and Jared snoring to my left.... The sun woke us up at 6.00 and we began to make a fire so we could toast our bread and make tea. That didn't happen, however, because a park ranger comes and ruins the fun. Camping in the nature reserve is forbidden and so is making fires. He was taking pictures of us for proof! The fine was supposed to be 700 shekles per person but because we were American and "didn't know," he let us off the hook. Then the park ranger looked at me and recognized me! A month before, I had done a different hike on the same mountain and he remembered me. :) Israel really is a small country.... So anyways, we ate our bread non-toasted and had water instead of tea. We cleaned up the campsite and went on our way... About a mile in, we were already sweating and hot and we found a beautiful natural pool and went swimming/cliff jumping. (Picture above) We hiked for another 20 minutes and found mooree pools /rivers. Another hour of hiking and we got to a waterfall with caves surrounding it. We went swimming and ate lunch and I dozed off for a little nap. By then I was exhausted, but we still had about 2 hours untill the end of the hike. The next hour was mostly climbing up boulders to the top of the mountain, and the last hour was at the top of the mountain walking around it to the campsite. We walked past a lot of cows and horses and met some other hikers on the way. We got to the campsite and I literally fell down I was so tired... I bought a chocolate ice cream  (ice cream has never, ever tasted so good before!) filled up my water, and then we were on our way.... We didn't want to stay at the campsite because it costed 30 sheckles, so we decided we'd find another place to sleep and walked down the road untill we found a bus stop. We ran into some other year coursers from a different section at a random bus stop in the middle of nowhere (Again, Israel is so small....!) and on the side of the road, cooked rice on our camping stove and waited for a bus to Tiberias. We got to Tiberias and found a nice spot on the kinneret with bathrooms/grass to sleep on/fire pits. We hung out there, made dinner, smoked huka with our neighbors,and then went to sleep at like 9 because we were so damn exhausted from the long busy day. We woke up and went for a swim in the kinneret. we layed around there for a while and then brought a picnic table into the kinneret to eat lunch! That was the first time I've ever cooked and eaten lunch in a body of water:)) Me and Rebecca found a ride into the city to buy some fruit. I bought some fresh apples and pears and we sat on the kinneret and talked to some cute Israeli soldiers. They talked to us about the army for a while and then helped me study for my Hebrew test the following day(which I aced!) Turns out they were traveling back to Tel Aviv like us, so we all left and went back together. :)) Weekend is over and now I'm writing a paper for my Israeli film class and cooking beans, green beans and eggs. Enjoy my pictures on facebook!!!!!!



http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2095988&id=1275210092&l=81b2227e07 Pictures from this trip