Coming home.

Jeff and I are heading to the airport. We are coming home. It's been an amazing trip and we have lots of stories to tell. See you all soon!

Pet rock?

Petra! Indiana Jones! Rocks! Hiking! Cool sites! Tired.

The saga continues...

Hello from Amman, Jordan! We just arrived today. It's been a quite unique and exciting trip to Jordan, and that's only with the border crossing! Jeff and I got to ride in an armor plated Suburban (windshields about 2 inches thick and a blast door for a trunk) from Jerusalem to the border of Jordan. We then got dumped off at customs, stood in line for more then an hour to travel literally 10 feet for a stamp in our passport, hopped onto a bus, got dropped off right before the Jordanian border (about 4km of no-man's land between Israel and Jordan), and was stopped and told we couldn't cross because we didn't have visas. Luckily we had some amazing connections (Jackie's cousins) who had got the chief of the border customs to call the Ministry of Internal Affairs to get us OK'd to go into Jordan without visas. We waited a long time as calls were made and finally we got clearance. We shook hands with the Chief and left in another armored Suburban.

Kid's camp was really fun and I met a lot of great people who took time out of their lives to serve these kids. I had four 13 year old boys in my room. There were really great kids. They had a lot of questions and they talked a lot too. It was also really great to work with the kitchen staff and help them out. It was good to be able to stay in one place for longer then 24 hours.

Jeff and I will be staying in Jordan for several days exploring here and there. Especially Petra. I'll post more pictures when I can. Below is a picture I took in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Old City Jerusalem. (If you didn't know you can always click on the little picture below to see the big picture)

To Paradise and Back

Jeff and I are back from Galilee and the Golan area a bit early. We have changed our plans a bit (A bit more detail at the end about our plan). We rampaged through the Galilee, Golan, and North Coast Israel these past couple days. We visited Mt. Carmel where Elijah had challenged the prophets of Baal (1 Kings 18:25-40). Then we drove through Nazareth, got lost looking for a place to stay, so we headed eastward to the Sea of Galilee to find a place to lay our heads down. We ended up in Tiberias, a fully commercialised tourist town. We found a nice place to check in and we headed out to the town to look around. We grabbed a bite to eat and rested for our journey onward. The next day we visited Capernum, Mount of Beatitudes, Church of the Loaves and Fish (where Jesus multiplied the fish and bread to feed the 4000 people), and we then, unfortunately, visited Korazin (Matt 11:21-24) and blew a tire on our rental car. We got the spare donut attached and drove out to find the closest Budget rental car place. We eventually found it but it was Shabbat and it was closed. We headed to Acco, explored, and stayed there a night. We got our flat fixed the next morning and continued our trek through Northern Israel. We hit up thge beautiful Tel Dan, Banyas, and Nimrod Fortress. After a nice bake in the sun from visiting these places we headed back down to the Sea of Galilee to stay in Tiberias again. This morning we slept in a bit and headed out to Beit She'an (which was amazing), then Tel Megiddo (where in Revelation Armageddon, the last battle is suppose to happen.), and to Caesarea. We arrived back at Ayelet's place shortly afterwards to prepare for our next adventure. Kids Camp! We are going to volunteer to work at the camp Ayelet is currently working at right now. Below is a picture of Jeff and I by the Mediterranean sea at Caesarea.

Onward Ho!

Jeff and I are heading up to Galilee for 4-6 days and will probably be without internet. I'll post as soon as I have internet access again.

Hot stuff

Jeff and I are back from the dead. See? We spent two days by the Dead Sea at Qumran, Masada and En Gedi. Qumran was where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. Masada was the faciniating and emotional story of rebel Israeli's fighting the Roman army. En Gedi was an oasis in the hot desert that King David probably stayed at during his fleeing from Saul. Here is a picture from up top of Masada looking down to the Dead Sea.

Holy Land escapades

You can feel the city of Jerusalem alive. The constant murmuring of different tongues. The sounds of distant church bells ringing. The shop owners at the bazaars shouting for your attention. One amazing moment during the trip so far was being in the St. Anna church by the the pool of Bethsheda. The church is known for it's amazing acoustics. What really hit me hard, in a good way of course, was when different groups of people came into the church and started singing worship songs in both their own language and also in English. I sat and sang with them in English as they sung in their own tongue. It was my brothers and sisters from around the world singing together in Jerusalem. If we could see heaven on Earth it would be this experience I had. Then a Christian Muslim man stood up, told us the lyrics he was about to sing and sang the song solo in Arabic. It was so moving. The best part of it was that over the loud speaker outside was another Muslim announcing the daily prayer for Islam but as the Christian Muslim sung it would completely drown out the loud speaker and all you could hear was the Christian Muslim's song to God. Anyways, below is a picture of two weary but excited travelers with their most favorite and trusty Israeli guide.