In addition to the travelling, I have continued my relaxing on my kibbutz and frequenting Jerusalem to visit my sister and friends. Another reason for going to Jerusalem is that once I get released from the army, they stop paying for me to live on the kibbutz. Therefore I need to start moving my things out of the kibbutz. I have waaaay to many things in order to make the move in one trip. Every time I went to Jerusalem I would take a large bag of things and leave it at my sister's appartment.
IDF Naval Museum in Haifa Ghetto Fighters Holocaust Museum in Kibbutz Lohamei Hageta'ot Rosh Hanikra Yehiam Fortress, Kibbutz Yehiam 4x4 Offroad Tour Nimrod's Castle Banias Nature Reserve
I have broken the post down into the following sites. You can click on the link to jump to that specific part of the post. If your lazy and don't want to read you can jump right to all the pictures I uploaded on these 2 pages here and here.
Very interesting museum which had a lot of artifacts including a battleship and a submarine that we were able to walk through. The museum discussed the history of the Navy from how it was established to the present day operations that are declassified. The Navy started with a single passenger ship - its crew were not military personnel but anyone who knew anything about boats or water became part of the navy. The few guns and cannons they did have were not intended for boat use and were extremely inaccurate. Fake dummy guns were mounted to the ships so they would appear to be powerful.
I had always thought that the living quarters on a ship/sub were really crappy - very cramped, small spaces, etc. Now having walked through the two ships all I could think was look at all this space! From the perspective of someone who lived in a tank, a ship didn't seem that bad in terms of living conditions. The only downside I could see is that in the navy you can spend 3-4 weeks straight at sea.
The kibbutz was founded by holocaust survivors and those that faught in the Warsaw ghetto uprising - hence the name of the kibbutz which means ghetto fighters. It was an excellent museum with many artifacts. In the museum ther was a large section specifically devoted to the uprising of the Warsaw ghetto. I tagged along to a tour that was in process and there were two fantastic stories that the guide talked about. The first one being about the Treblinka extermination camp. A model of the camp had been created by one of the founders of the kibbutz who was one of only 70 people to ever escape the camp. The tour guide described the entire process that the nazis used to exterminate the Jews. Over 700,000 Jews were systematically killed in the gas chambers in under just one year. The camp was designed as a killing machine in order to kill as many jews in the most efficient way possible. The process was streamlined and attention to detail great in order to keep the Jews fooled as to where they were heading until the very last minute. When the train pulled into the station the Jews would disembark and be led to beleive that they needed to take showers before being processed into the camp, when in fact once they got into the 'showers' they were gassed. Towards the war once the Nazis realized that they were going to lose they began to destroy all the evidence of the secret camp by burning the bodies instead of burring them and completely erasing any evidence of the existance of the extermination camp.
The second story was about Janusz Korczak - a Polish Jew. He was a widely known, successful and respected figure within Poland. He was a children's author and a pediatrician and an owner of an orphanage. He continued to take care of the children when they were placed in the ghetto. Due to his public stature there were people who offered him help to get him out of the ghetto, however he continued to refuse the help unless the help was also extended to the children for whom he cared for. When it came to be for the children to be shipped off to the gas chambers in Treblinka, instead of Korczak accepting the help to escape he decided to stick with his children. Knowing that they were on their way to be murdered, Korczak dressed the 200 children up in their nicest clothes and kept the children calm as he accompanied them to their death.
Rosh Hanikra is located at the most northern point of coastal Israel. Just north of Rosh Hanikra is the border with Lebaanon. After taking the steepest cable car ride in the world (70 degree incline) to get down the the grottos where we see what the site describes as a never-ending love story between mountain and sea. Even on a calm day one can see and hear the water crashing into the rock walls. There was a fantastic view of the coast of Israel and I could even see all the way to Haifa!
The kibbutz is located close to the southern border with lebanon. I don't quite remember anything extremely interesting about the fortress (its been quite some time from the time I was there to the time I am blogging). This place was virtually impossible to get to without a car. There was a grand total of one bus that went there all day. And guess what! I missed it!!! I took a bus that took me closer to the kibbutz and then managed to catch a lift the rest of the way. Its so far in the middle of nowhere that I didn't see anyone else touring the fortress. The fortress was not overly exciting, but it did offer a great 360 degree view of the surrounding area. The fortress was somewhat of a dissapointment, however I didn't have anything better to do and it didn't cost me any money so I'm glad that I managed to at least drag myself off the couch.
I spent Shabbat with relatives that live up north a little south-west of the kinneret. On Saturday we went on an offroad 4x4 trip through the fields. It was a beatiful day with clear skies and we could see quite far. After a few days of rain during the week, everything looked extra green.
Picture of me with the kinneret in the background
Another great view. The previous picture was taken from the middle peak.
I thought that the Yehiam castle was difficult to get to; a piece of cake compared to Nimrod's castle. At least Nimrod's castle was worth the trouble. A car is really needed to get to these places. Nimrod's castle is at the base of the Hermon mountain overlooking the valley where kiryat shmoneh lies as well as the hills leading up to the golan heights including the Banias. The weather was very typical for the golan at this time. Believe it or not but the two pictures below were taken not even an hour apart. There was a bit of rain and clouds for a few hours but by noon it had completely cleared up and there wasn't a cloud in the sky for the rest of the day. It was windy on Nimrods castle because it was very high up. The fortress was huge - about 500m in length by 150 meters. When the clouds were not blocking the sky the view of the surrounding area was fantastic.
Southern part of the fortress
Northern part of the fortress
I caught a lift with a nice family from Nimrod's castle to the Banias Nature Reserve, which was only a 10 minute drive from the fortress. There was an option to hike down from the fortress, however it was a bit chilly, and I had managed to find a lift so I figured to take advantage of that. In addition, there was plenty of hiking to do at the nature reserve. Once at the nature reserve there were 4 different trails to walk. In about 2.5 hours I walked all 4 of the trails. In addition to the fantastic scenery, and the waterfall at the end of the hike there were lots of ancient ruins from the time of Herod.
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