I had trouble sleeping last night. I guess my attempt to preemptively beat jet lag failed miserably, as I was wide awake for most of the night.
By now I have started to make friends with some of the other tour members, and we were enjoying fun conversation most of the day. After breakfast, we got on the bus and traveled to the northern tip of Israel: the land of Dan, the tribe Samson was originally from, and the Golan Heights.
Many of the places we visited were Tels, big mounds of earth formed by a city being built and destroyed, built and destroyed, on and on for a couple of millennia. The first of these Tels was Hazor, a City conquered and burned to the ground by Joshua (you can still see the charred bricks and rocks in some places), rebuilt and destroyed in the time of the judges, rebuilt by Solomon, and then destroyed and abandoned according to a prophecy in Jeremiah, which states that Hazor would become a desolate place, no one would ever live there again. Today Hazor is just a dig sight, uncovering many layers of history, the only people there are archeologists, and tourists, no one actually lives there.
The next Tel was Tel Dan, a Danite city that has recently been uncovered. This sight is neat in both is Biblical and modern importance. The excavation at Dan has revealed an arch gateway dating back to the time of Abraham, making it the oldest arch gateway in the world, and it is very likely that Abraham walked through those gates during his lifetime. Another dig site revealed a high place, a place where the northern kingdom of Israel would sacrifice to idols after breaking away from Judah and rejecting God. This carries extra weight in Dan, as it was the location of one of the two Golden Calves made by Jeroboam. In More recent history, Dan marks the northern border of Israel, and exactly where the border should be is still contested. During one of the early wars of the modern state of Israel, the land surrounding Dan was captured from Syria and Lebanon, and the borders of these countries are still very visible from an old Israeli trench and bunker system on the north side of the Tel.
We then went even closer to the borders of Syria and Lebanon as we visited the remains of Caesarea Philippi. This was the hub of Roman paganism in Israel for many years, with several temples to various Greco-Roman deities lining the mountainside. One of which was situated in front of a large cave aptly named “the Gates of Hades.” Jesus took his disciples here for a few weeks during his ministry, and this is where he asked them “Who do people say that I am?” it where he also gave Simon the name Peter, and claimed he would build his church on the rock, and the Gates of Hades would not overcome his church. A few days later Jesus climbed up to the top of that mountain with Peter, James, and John and revealed his true glory to them, literally setting himself above the idols and temples below.
Much of the trip at this point focus primarially on more modern, conflicts. And in the Golan Heights we were able to see where during the Yom Kippur War a small group of Israeli Artillery not only held there own against, but also managed to push back a much larger Syrian army. We spent much time wandering near the borders of these neighboring countries, with fences and minefields being the only markers between them.
We then stopped during the afternoon to explore a local olive press, a company that found a way to use the byproducts of making olive oil to create an all natural cosmetic line. They also pride themselves on having the best olive oil in the world, and while I am no olive oil connoisseur, it was pretty good, good enough for me to buy some bottles to take home.
That night we returned to our hotel on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, and went swimming in the lake after supper.