After an uncharacteristically early start we headed up the coast road towards the north of Israel. Turning inland at the foot of the Carmel Mountains we wound our way up to a Druze village called Daliyat al-Karmel nestled in the hills. Being a weekday not a lot was happening in the old town apart from a few old timers with funny hats, we departed with only a tasty special Druze pita stop from from a road side vendor for our troubles.

In a manner that was to become quite familiar over the course of the two days we took a side road on the way back in an attempt to find a lookout. We never found the view we were looking for but did drive through some beautiful stunted forests and discover a monastery tucked away in the back woods.

Taking further back roads we wound through more gentle mountain scenery with an unsuccessful attempt to have a peek at a kibbutz (with the peaceful background sounds of rifle shots from a nearby army base). Our research for our 2012 Tasmanian commune will have to wait.

With my suspect navigation from a Hebrew map we eventually close upon our target for the day; the Sea of Galilee or the Kinneret in Hebrew. We found a delightful picnic spot high above the lake overlooking Tiberias and tucked into a delicious repast prepared by Alex from Tel Aviv’s Levinski Markets. Surrounding eucalypts gave a very Australian flavour to the scene.

Replete we aimed for more vantage points overlooking the Knesset but our map (or my navigational abilities) weren’t up to the task. Having missed them completely we decided to push back east in search of yet another lookout. Again taking an obscure side road, our luck in the lookout department wasn’t holding and we soon found ourselves on a gravel road that wound its way over the mountain. Along with obscure cemeteries, olive groves and memorials (to a H.C Anderson no less) we were treated with some magical views of the surrounding countryside with a brown tapestry of fields dotted with Arab villages – green domes and minarets piercing the mass of buildings.

Our attempts to push further down the other side of the mountain were aborted when the Golf bottomed out for the third time (I hope your mum isn’t reading this Alex) so we turned tail as the afternoon waned and – with some judicious technical driving from Alex – headed for our evening’s accommodation. Thanks to today’s technology I’ve gone back and found where we were on google earth – see the image below.

We stayed in Rosh Pinna one of the first Jewish settlements in the region. It contains some interesting old buildings populated by a slightly hippy crowd. A few whiskeys over a couple of games of backgammon (our new board game of choice) in front of a roaring open fire provided the perfect cap to the days activities.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 12th, 2007 at 6:31 am and is filed under israel, tim, travel log. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.