Day 9: October 20, Jerusalem to Masada

We are at the Masada youth hostel (a lovely, modern, sandstone building) sitting in the lobby with perhaps 20 teenagers trying to get our little piece of wifi....while they text each other from a chair away. We think they are all Dutch or German and they will probably be passing us tomorrow on the snake path as we walk to Masada for sunrise....starting at 5:40 (when the gate to the path opens).
 
It has been an eventful/uneventful day. We started by finally touring the crypt under our convent hotel to see some very historic street paving stones that date back to the time of Jesus. The paving stones are located 2 flights under the convent in a eerie stone crypt. We saw paving stones with striations to prevent horses from slipping and a few had games scratched in them that were used by Roman soldiers. As well, you could see some of the original water cisterns built by Hadrian. It really re-enforces that the original streets are many meters below where we walk today.

Dome of the Rock

 We then headed off to the Dome of the Rock. Non-Muslims can only enter the courtyard via a wooden ramp that runs over the Western Wall. We stood in line for over an hour only to arrive at 11am, closing time for non-Muslims. We had about 5 minutes before they kicked us out, somewhat politely, but very firmly. That was our final stop in Jerusalem, so it was back to the convent to pick up our packs and head off via the metro to the central bus station for a bus to Masada. We have finally got the transportation systems mastered so no more taxis. And transportation is a real deal in Israel. We spent about $1 each to take the Metro.


Our bus drove about an hour and a half through the desert, occasionally past palm groves but mostly sand hills with no visible vegetation, always with the Dead Sea to our left. At Masada there is only the youth hostel and a huge visitor center. The bus turns off the highway and drops passengers for Masada about 100 meters from the front door of the hostel. We managed to tour the visitor center this afternoon getting our bearings, including scoping out the factory discount store!

Snake path

The hostel has a lovely swimming pool and big picture windows overlooking the Dead Sea. We have a very small and immaculate twin room with a private bath and comfortable beds with lovely sheets. We had a huge buffet dinner with meat and salads. There was halibut, something they called roast beef (did not look like roast beef so we were a bit skeptical) and chicken schnitzel, which is like flattened chicken nuggets and appears frequently on menus.

We have not been able to reach our cousin Peggy by phone but not for lack of trying every variation of dialing a long distance number on a Canadian phone in Israel. The hostel let us know she had phoned looking for us.

While we had two cooler days in Jerusalem we are now back in the heat and sunshine. Tomorrow, when we walk up the snake path at dawn, it will be 22 to 25C. We will, as per Sulfur Mountain, ride the cable car down