Way of the Sea

Today we started at Haifa and drove down the coast to Jaffa, enjoying beautiful sea views all the way. The Roman Aqueduct outside Caesarea was one of my favorite spots!

Before we got to the sea we passed through Nazareth and talked about the fact that Joseph and Mary were part of a group of descendants of David that lived in the area. We would have expected them to live in Jerusalem.

Next we stopped at Haifa, where we enjoyed the beautiful view from a little area above the B'Hai faith headquarters.

Does it get any better than Roman aqueducts and blue ocean? I think not!

And to make it even better, Crystal and I got to dip our toes into the Mediterranean Sea!

In addition to the aqueduct, we stopped at the ruins of Caesaria, not far away.

It was fun to imagine what these ruins looked like in their heyday!

The amphitheater has been fixed up so they can use it for performances today. In ancient times it was twice as big! We wished Amanda had been with us to test the acoustics with an aria!

Our last stop was Jaffa. Who knew that it was the same Joppa talked about in the Bible. Jonah sailed from Joppa and ended up in the belly of a whale!

They have a very pretty church of St. Peters there in honor of the church changing its direction to start branching out to the gentiles as well as the Jews.

Do these look like weary travelers who are excited to go home tomorrow and sleep in our own beds? Yes! It has been a great trip, but 16 days is a LONG time to be gone!

On a sad note, Israel changes to daylight savings time tomorrow at 2 a.m. That means our 4 a.m. transfer to the airport will feel like 3 a.m.!

We said goodbye to our fellow travelers, singing Shalom Chaverim with them on the bus. We had a family join us a few days ago that is living in Kazakhstan. The mother's name was Mabel! It made us think of how much fun it will be to see our grandchildren when we get home. Too bad they will be in Colorado!