The Jerusalem Bird Observatory

 

This is the Knesset, the building where the Israeli parliament convenes. It's about a twenty-minute walk from our house. The Knesset is built on a hilltop that also houses the Supreme Court building, the Israel Museum, the Science Museum, and Hebrew University, among others. It's a busy area, full of important government buildings and significant tourist attractions. Nestled on a small plot of land in between all these buildings is an unlikely find: the Jerusalem Bird Observatory. Israel is in a major migratory corridor, and is known for its birding, but most birders travel south to the Negev desert or Eilat, or north to the Galilee or Golan to see exotic birds moving through the country. But in the right season, lots of birds stop here in the big city for a drink or a rest; many pause at the little stream up on the hillside by the Knesset. We visited the Observatory at the end of the spring migratory season, so we didn't see a lot of birds, but there were a few small ones playing in the water, and plenty of shade and birdsong during our visit. It was worth the walk to see this little gem of a place in the middle of the bustling city. I'd love to come back to Israel when the kids are a little older to see more migrating birds, but for now, our little excursion to the Jerusalem Bird Observatory was a nice start!

(Translation: Cyprus Tree)

 

 

Old Jerusalem Train Station

The Old Jerusalem Train Station has been converted into a place called "First Station," which houses restaurants, shops, and daily craft shows. We headed down to the station because there are -- no joke -- Formula One racing cars on display there this week, and we wanted to check them out. Unfortunately, we were turned away -- turns out the cars are only on display at night -- but we still enjoyed First Station, where they had a cool play area for kids, including trains (of course) and go-cart bikes that Alexander could not get enough of. With its shaded boardwalk, bike path, and relaxed cafes, First Station is a nice little spot in Jerusalem!

And here are a couple of pictures of Benjamin, just for fun. He's turning into a happy little boy, and he's come up with some creative uses for my yoga mat! Is it a hat? A tent? You decide...

Walking the Ramparts of the Old City: Part Two

Because it wasn't too hot today (only about 80 degrees), we decided to head back to the Old City to explore the other, northern half of the Ramparts Walk, which is an elevated walkway along the Old City's perimeter walls. In an earlier post, I described the southern route, which skirts the Armenian and Jewish quarters of the Old City. Today we walked above the Christian and Arab quarters.

This walk was longer than the southern route, but I'm glad we went back to do it, since there is so much to see and the views are terrific. We passed by the Christian quarter first, noticing restaurant patios, some residences, and distant church spires. Then, after passing by the Damascus Gate, we walked along the Arab quarter. If we looked to the right, we saw stone buildings seemingly piled and slapped one atop the other; residences are packed tightly into that ancient section of the city. If we looked to the left, we saw the bustling streets of East Jerusalem neighborhoods and then, around the corner, Mount Scopus, the Mount of Olives, and other hills and valleys.

Walking along the ramparts gives you a perspective that is difficult to find when walking through the Old City itself. The Old City streets are tight, labyrinthine, shaded, often crowded, and, at times, fairly disorienting. Up above the Old City, we can get a sense of just how the approximately 40,000 people fit into a .35 square mile area.  At the same time, walking the perimeter allows you to see the different "quarters" in this city within a city.

Here are some photos of our walk around the northern section of the Ramparts walk, followed by a few pictures taken as we walked back up through the Old City itself, and finally sat down for a lunch of falafel in the Jewish quarter before returning home for well-deserved naps!

Picking Almonds in the Playground

A couple of days ago, when we were down at the playground, some young girls were picking berries from vines growing by a stone wall; they shared the berries with Alexander and he left the park with a purple-stained mouth.

 

This morning, Eric and Alexander came back from their trip to the playground with a handful of almonds picked from the almond tree that is a few steps away from Alexander's beloved slide. Here are some photos of the tree and the almonds. I didn't get a picture of Alexander loading up his little dump truck with almonds later on in the day, but it was pretty cute.

 

Picking fresh almonds is certainly not something we've experienced in New Jersey. One of the fun things about spending time in a different climate is that we find foods that might seem exotic to us growing in abundance. Almond, olive, and citrus trees are all over Jerusalem, along with herbs like rosemary and sage. We've really enjoyed finding fresh fruit, nuts, and herbs in the middle of the bustling city!

 

An "Awesome" Hike in the Aminadav Forest

We spent the morning in the Aminadav Forest, which is just outside Jerusalem. This gem of a preserve consists of mostly replanted trees (the organization that reforested the area boasts that they've planted 230 million trees over 250,000 acres) through which there are many good trails for hiking, biking and riding 4x4 vehicles. The hike we went on passes several ancient springs, some ruins from olive presses, and hillsides covered with stone terraces. The bonus for today: in a great little picnic area, we found not only two seesaws, but about a half dozen sculptures of sheep! Totally random, I know, but the sheep pretty much made Alexander's day. He learned how to say "awesome" today, and he kept going up to the fake sheep, saying, "awesome!" Some of us like sheep sculptures; others of us like a dry sunny day and the sound of the wind blowing through the pine trees. Either way, we all found today's hike to be pretty awesome.

 

Both boys crashed for early naps right after the hike. I sat in the car with them outside our house for over an hour. By the way, this scenario, with both of them napping at the same time: it rarely happens. But every once in a while, we get lucky!

Masada and the Dead Sea

If you drive west from Jerusalem on Route 1, you head into the West Bank and towards Jordan. As soon as you leave the rim of mountains on which the city is built, you begin to descend quickly toward the Judean desert and the Dead Sea. You leave a densely covered landscape of buildings interspersed with cyprus, pine and fruit trees; within a few miles, you're driving through bald, brown hills that house little except for the occasional Bedouin camp. These camps look like they've come from another world, or at least another time, with their temporary structures made of corrugated metal and cloth, and goats wandering the dessicated landscape. When you hit sea level, you'll see a marker on the side of the highway; there, you can pull into a rest stop and pay 5 shekels (about $1.25) to sit on a tired-looking camel. Today we drove this route so we could take a look at the Dead Sea and to make our way to the top of Masada.

Masada is the site of an ancient military fortification; it is exceptional because its location, which is on top of one of the mountains that rises steeply from the western side of the Dead Sea. The top of the mountain is a massive plateau, thus it is an ideal location for a military outpost. Masada was famously rebuilt by Herod the Great, who constructed extravagant palaces and a complex that included residences, storehouses, cisterns and buildings for worship. Many years later, after the destruction of the second temple, Jewish rebels escaped to Masada. The story goes that when the Romans besieged the fortress, eventually building a ramp up which they drove a giant battering ram, they entered Masada to find that all the remaining inhabitants had committed mass suicide.

In the past century, massive archaeological digs have unearthed many of the structures that existed at Masada, including portions of Herod's impressive northern palace, which is perched precariously over the side of the cliff, facing north toward the Dead Sea. Today, Masada is Israel's number one tourist site. In addition, the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) holds its nighttime swearing-in ceremonies for new soldiers on the top of Masada.

The traditional way to get to the fortress is to hike up the steep "Snake Trail," but we opted for the other route up: cable car. We'll come back and hike up with the boys when they can carry their own weight! Once up there, we enjoyed the views, and we had a good time checking out the ruins, including a giant cistern and some beautiful tile floors. In the video below, taken from the cliff on which Herod build the northern palace, you can hear jets flying in the background. Several military jets were flying low over the Dead Sea during our visit; they were loud and impressive!

 

 

Just below Masada lies the Dead Sea. At nearly 1400 feet below sea level, the Dead Sea is the lowest point on earth. The salty, mineral-rich waters of the Dead Sea are known for their health benefits; it's a ritual of many tourists to swim, or more accurately, "float" in the salty sea, then wash in the mud on the shores. Eric and I did both of those things on our previous visit to the Dead Sea, but we figured it was a little bit too much of an undertaking with two babies, so we just took in the beauty of the sea from the road.

The unfortunate thing is that the Dead Sea is quickly disappearing. Eric's been to Israel many times now (his first trip here was in high school) and he can clearly remember that the shores of the Sea used to be much higher than they are now. In fact, the Sea has dropped about 70 feet in the past 35 or 40 years. The level is dropping at such an alarming rate because the waters of the Jordan River, which feeds into the Dead Sea, are used heavily for agricultural purposes. So it's pretty simple: because so much water is being diverted up north to provide water to grow food for Israel and Jordan, very little water is trickling down into the Dead Sea. To add to the Sea's troubles, a huge portion of its mass has been converted into a series of dikes, canals and evaporation pans that are used by industrial companies who mine the sea for minerals like potash and magnesium. Because of the high salinity of the Sea, it doesn't support the traditional array of marine and terrestrial life that you might find near such a large body of water; perhaps for that reason some might argue the loss of the Sea is not so important. Still, the loss of the Sea would bring major changes to the region, so conservation efforts are underway in both Israel and Jordan in order to preserve the Dead Sea. However, as far as I know, the Sea's level continues to drop. It will be interesting to see what happens to this unique and beautiful place in the coming years.