Overall, Israel is extremely diverse for such a small country in every sense of the word. It houses so many different peoples, religions, cultures, environments, climates, languages and attitudes that generalizing about it becomes rather difficult. But that doesn’t mean I won’t try it... :)

The first signs that I’m arriving some place rather different was in Zurich, on the plane to Tel Aviv. Shadowing the plane as it taxied down the runway was an armored personnel carrier, which stayed with us, guns pointed at the plane, until our wheels lost contact with the concrete. This was after we had to go through another security scan (though a trivial one) before boarding the plane. Terrorism watch had begun.

I arrived in Tel Aviv and was picked up at the airport and driven to Netanya, a beach community a bit farther north. My first travel day was spent exploring Tel Aviv, and at night I had quite an adventure making it to Ashdod, about an hour south of Tel Aviv, to spend the night with the Gelmans there. You see, I had arranged to meet Michael Gelman at the train station in Tel Aviv on his way home. Unfortunately, he and I ended up at different stations, and by the time I made it back to the right one, they had driven off. Fortunately, buses run reasonably frequently in Israel, and I could get by pretty well speaking English and Russian, though Hebrew would have been a real bonus.

The next day was also spent in Tel Aviv, and then I took a day bus tour of Jerusalem and Bethlehem. I spent the following two days in Jerusalem before returning to Ashdod. On Saturday, May 30, the Gelmans and I went to visit the ruins in Caesaria and on Sunday we drove to Masada, Ein Gedi, and the Dead Sea, which ended up being as far south as I got to visit.

As June began, I rented a car for a week and drove north to Haifa, the white cliffs and water-filled caverns of Rosh Haniqra, and the old city of Akko. Leaving the coast I hiked to Montfort castle, drove through the small artist community of Rosh Pinna to the large artist community and Jewish spiritual center of Tsvat. I used Tsvat as a home base to explore the far North - the Golan Heights with a hike through Baniass and exploration of Tel Hazor and Nimrod’s Castle.

After Tsvat, I started to make my way back south. I circumnavigated Yam Kinneret (Lake Kinneret) by car, stopping at Korazim, Capernaum, Tiberius, Kursi, and at a small beach for a swim in the lake. Heading further south I drove up the hills to Belvoir castle and on to the huge archeological site at Bet She’an, and then to Nazareth before returning to Netanya. With only 2.5 days left in Israel, I decided that I had not had enough of Jerusalem yet and spent the remainder of my time there before catching a flight to Izmir, Turkey.

Traveling through Israel gave me a hands-on education that is impossible to duplicate by anything short of direct contact. I feel like I have completed a course entitled Comparative Western Religions by Example. I have climbed to the Temple Mount where Mohammed first ascended to heaven on his white steed; I went to shabbat services and dinner with a Hassid family in Jerusalem, davening at the Wailing Wall; and I have walked in the footsteps of another famous Jew from Nazareth who roamed Israel two millennia ago.