Day 3

Day three of our adventures in Israel!

We were all woken up at five fifteen in the morning as we got ourselves packed up to leave the hotel. We put our luggage on the bus (no easy feat) and headed off to Masada. Although too tired to show emotion of any kind, all of us were undoubtedly excited to take on whatever this day had to offer.

After the nauseating, roller-coaster-like ride to Masada, the class charged up the Roman Ramp. On Masada we saw amazing sights such as where the Romans broke into the fortress and the synagogues that were used. We had a very special tefillah at the fortress, with people coming in and taking pictures.  We literally, as Zach and Kayla put it, “Became a tourist attraction.”  Yaakov, Avi and Julia led tefillah. Torah readers were Julia, Zachary, Jennifer and Rachel. Everyone did a splendid job, and we received a lot of compliments about tefillah from those who had “popped in.” After some more sightseeing we got ready for the long descent down the mountain’s snake path. The tricky part wasn’t getting speed, it was containing it so that you didn’t fall straight down the path. Rachel came down first and promptly did twenty jumping jacks. Hard to know where she gets all that energy. After finishing the trail, the class enjoyed cold popsicles as we waited for the bus, and waited, and waited…

Then we took off for the Dead Sea.  Of course, we had to eat first. Then we got changed and we went into the water.  After making the astonishing discovery that we could float, we had a lot of fun in the water.  Soon we all had to take showers and went straight to the mud pits, where we covered ourselves from head to toe in Dead Sea mud.  After that, we were all  extremely muddy, so we went back into the sea and repeated the cycle.  And then we BURNED in the painfully salty sea.

Once we left the Dead Sea we headed over to Ein Gedi, the oasis in the desert.  There we went on yet another hike, SO MANY STAIRS, to a lake with a refreshing waterfall. The whole class had a water fight in which each one of us, countless times, were pushed into the water and splashed in the face. During this time we drenched Yonit, our tour guide, seconds after she got in the water! Luckily the bus driver didn’t notice as our soaked tour guide got into the bus. We dried off, got on the bus and went on our way to the holy city of Jerusalem.

We finally arrived in Jerusalem. The Welcoming Committee (Kayla, Jennifer and Rachel) set up an activity for the whole class. With our eyes closed, we wandered out of the bus holding onto the person in front of us. We were led to an overlook of the City and we stopped to breathe in the Jerusalem sounds.  We opened our eyes at the same time and each took in the breathtaking view that is the City of Jerusalem. Four of us had never visited Jerusalem and each one of them spoke about how different it is real life rather than in a picture. We stood in a circle singing Yerushalayim Shel Zahav and we thanked God for bringing us here together.

We got settled into our new hotel rooms, we ate dinner and headed out to Ben Yehuda Street.  There we split into three different groups and went exploring.  Although the main purpose of this expedition was to buy gifts, we ended up just buying food instead.! Peanut butter was a popular choice, as was Nutella and ice cream. Shocking.

So as the eighth grade gathered around a table, we all ate our various food choices and headed off, back to the hotel. The Jerusalem Tower is so close to Ben Yehuda, it is totally cool.

We hope to write tomorrow, and we will if we have time to blog before Shabbat.