Goodbye Tel Aviv, hello Haifa. Loaded up and off we go for a day of exploration. First stop, Caesarea. Herod built a quite impressive port in the 1st century here. Yup, more Roman ruins. Our 5th amphitheater so far. Those Romans were every where in this part of the world. Loved their entertainment venues. Gee, somethings have not changed in 2000 years... just saying... ;). This huge complex had a hippodrome too. Not just for chariot races, lions pitted against defenseless Christians and gladiators fought each other. Some hockey games today, have not changed too much... The Roman Empire fell by the 3rd century, to which this port city was taken over by the crusaders. When they left, it fell into ruin. Today, one can stroll the evidence of its remains. Next stop was a home visit at a olive farm and lunch hosted by a widowed fascinating Hasidic Jewish woman, Shoshi. We were employed to work at bit to make one of the dishes for our lunch. Cooking pita bread with toppings in a traditional Bedouin oven, a tandir. Quite tasty. Shoshi regaled with the history as to how her family generations immigrated to this land and how the farm came to be as it is today. Very very interesting. Fully sated and a bottle of her olive oil, off we went to Haifa. One of the two major port cities of Israel. Our bus hauled us up Mount Carmel to a breathtaking view of the city and the Baha'i Gardens. Evening was spent in our new hotel's happy hour. Only wine for adult beverages, which was nice. Mark and I set off to find some local lager. No surprise, it was a success. 😋🍻. Note, we are in Israel during Purim. Not uncommon to see all sorts of costumed people walking around. This celebrates- "they tried to kill us, they did not kill us, let's eat". Tomorrow, Safed, and much more. Come back!
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