Another great day! We started off driving to Jerusalem to learn more about the history of the city. Our first stop was the ancient City of David, conquered by King David in around BCE. We saw a movie about the history of Jerusalem and the archeological excavations of a building that many archeologists believe was King David's palace.
Our next stop was Hezekiah's Tunnel. For about 20 minutes we walked through knee deep fresh water that flows through man made tunnels from the period of King Hezekiah. This water tunnel secured the main source of fresh water to the ancient city of Jerusalem. We then walked along the ancient path that lead up to the Western Wall of the Ancient Holy Temple.
Our lunch in the Jewish Quarter of the Old city was fast food "Old City of Jerusalem style"- falafel and shawarma with hummus, salad and French fries.
After lunch we learned about Jerusalem during the time of the Roman Empire, when the city was set on fire and the Holy Temple was destroyed. We then went over to the the Western Wall, the Kotel, where we wrote personal prayers on little notes and took the notes that we brought from the students at Lippman to place in the Wall. There was time for personal prayer as well.
From there we started our drive down south to the desert (yes, we saw shepherds with sheep and goats and camels in the desert hills). When we reached our destination, a Bedouin Oasis designed to teach about the Bedouins and their way of life, we unloaded from the bus and climbed on camels. We all had a lot of fun riding on camels in a caravan through the desert! After the camel rides we sat together in a large Bedouin tent and were given a chance to hear about Bedouin life and ask questions. We had sweet hot tea brewed on an open fire and black coffee. Next we had a fun Bedouin style dinner eating sitting on mattress pads on the floor. Our after dinner activities, lead by our counselor, Dikla, were fun games, a bonfire, s'mores and singing. Everyone had a good time and you could feel the warmth of friendship and comraderie that are such an important part of a trip like this. At the end of the evening, we got ready for bed and climbed into sleeping bags to sleep in a large Bedouin tent.
Tomorrow morning we are on the road at 4:30 am to drive to the foot of Massada and climb the Roman Ramp in time to see the sunrise over the Dead Sea.
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