Elijah on Mt. Carmel and the Jezreel Valley

This trip really gave me more of an appreciation for Elijah.  He was an amazing prophet who always stood for the Lord, and mostly did it alone.  Here is a statue atop Mt. Carmel in honor of Elijah slaying the wicked preists of Baal when the Lord sent down fire to consume Elijah's sacrifice.

The Jezreel valley is just below Mt. Carmel and has a huge presence in the Old Testament, including being the site of the death of Ahab and Jezebel. 

Caesarea

Herod built this coastal city (along with a majority of other ancient ruins we saw--he was a busy guy!) and it is mentioned in the Bible.  It was here that Paul made his defense before Festus and King Agrippa.  There was also a 12 mile-long aqueduct to carry water to the city (last picture).
 

 

 

Israel: The Traffic

When we first arrived, we headed for downtown Jaffa.  This photo was our first roundabout in the bus and it took about 5 minutes to get around it.  In the words of our guide, our driver was a "bus artist."  And thank goodness!!!  There were many, many times we were thankful for Mohammad Abu Ghabi and his driving skills, not to mention his GQ style!  He was the best dressed and most professional of any bus driver we saw.


A normal parking situation:

 

Israel A Picture A Day

Mostly because I can't look at that pink slime meat picture any longer...

I give you Israel, A Picture (or 2) a day.  I'll likely keep at it till I get bored, or until the garden really has to get planted and weeded, etc. etc.  I realized I am never going to actually blog the whole thing.  We are doing a shutterfly book that we may finish before we die, (though not at this rate!) and that is where all my efforts to record our trip and photos is going.  But, for those of you friends/family who we only see virtually, this will assuage my guilt and give you something to see and read.



Isreal is almost exactly halfway around the world from where we live.  Which means, a LONG flight!  The point of this whole trip was that it was our 10-year anniversary, so we used all our frequent flyer miles to upgrade our tickets to first-class.  Chris has always had a dream of flying upstairs on a 747 and now he can check that off his bucket list.  And, yes, it was worth it!

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This is just gross...

No More Tonsils

Calla had her tonsills and adenoids out last Thursday. Already she snores less! She's been a trooper! Here she is waiting to go back into surgery:

and with all the puzzles she did on Sunday:

Home from the Holy Land

For those of you who knew we were going to Israel for 2 weeks, never fear, we are home alive and well. I (we) are still trying to decide how to document our amazing trip and keep us from forgetting all that we learned (ie what are we going to DO with 2100 pictures and lots of study guides and journal entries?). Here are just a few pictures to prove we went and returned. Stay tuned for actual information when I can stay awake after 7:30 p.m.!