Caesarea, Acre and Nazareth

Day 2

Up and running for a big breakfast to keep us going during a busy day.  On the coach by 8.30 am with the first stop in Caesarea.  It's a coastal town which was built up and used to import and export goods to provinces in the Middle East.  After the Romans kicked out the ruling family of Maccabees, they appointed a governor who was the son of a butler.  He styled himself, Herod the Great ( the one who slew all the babies in Bethlehem). He built a great harbour to curry favour with the Romans, a theatre and a hippodrome to attract people to live there,( and of course pay taxes) and a fabulous palace with an outdoor swimming pool overlooking the sea.

The palace of Herod the Great

The amphitheatre.  The plastic seats are for a concert and certainly not from Biblical times.

 Marble from Italy and cedar trees from Lebanon were imported to make the palace the best. He had three sons, each called Herod, not much imagination, and they each eventually ruled in different parts of the province.  The elder Herod fell for his brother's wife, Herodia, and had his brother killed so that he could take his wife.  At the time, John the Baptist was in the area and publicly criticising Herod so  Herodia arranged for her daughter Salome to dance for Herod.  As a reward she asked for John's head on a silver salver and the rest is history.  Still that might have been a better fate than living in the hole in the ground that Herod had put him in.  

It is also thought that St Paul was arrested and questioned by Herod here but as a Roman citizen, Paul claimed his right to be tried in Rome.

On then up the coast to the crusader city of Acre now called Akko.  The citadel is more like an indoor town with vaulted halls, courtyards, tunnels, huge staircases over at least three levels.  It was ravaged and razed several times but never completely destroyed, just the top levels were collapsed into the bottom level.  However in the 60s a decision was made to dig it out and restore it and they have done a really sympathetic job.  Our guide said that in Israel so much is political.  The Israelis are constantly trying to find bones and artefacts to prove that their ancestors were there first and the Palestinians are doing the same.  But as 25% of the national taxation goes on defence, there is not enough left for archeology.  Consequently universities fund students of archeology to dig on the sites but keep 60% of whatever is discovered.  So private collections get the gold, silver, jewellery etc and the state gets the pottery, for example.

The Crusaders' fortress at Akko

Our party were shown a recommended restaurant nearby for lunch but the tables were already set with salad, pickles, hummus etc and we weren't that hungry after the big breakfast.  We wandered on a bit and found a little outdoor cafe with a very pleasant man who told us he only opened last week.  It was all very new and clean.  We wondered if there might not be a loo as it was really just an alcove in a wall but sure enough, there was a new, clean though tiny loo at the back.  The downside was that it had no door, only a makeshift curtain across it.  Worse, the curtain only came down to knee height.  Sandra took the plunge first, Carol stood guard and the owner dragged a bit of board half way across???

Laughing like drains, we staggered back up to the coach after Lynn had been ripped off by a nougat seller.  The stall was very attractively set out but I do hope she got a piece that had not been walked over by the flies.

Inland next, to Nazareth, to the Church of the Annunciation.  The church was beautiful, only built in the 60s around the cave said to be the house of Mary.  The cave is beautifully preserved and decorated, in the lower level of the church and it felt genuinely moving to be in such a place.  The church and it's surrounding walls are decorated with art from around the world.

The modern frontage of the Church of the Annunciation

The altar in the cave of the Annunciation

  Further up the path is another church housing the remains of Joseph's workshop.

You do have to use your imagination a fair bit as Nazareth is a modern, built up city and it seems odd to see signs like Narareth Pizzas.  But as we drove out towards Tiberias in Gallilee, the countryside opened out into rolling plains.  We passed a small hump shaped mountain, Mount Tabor, but I forget what happened there.  Information overload.  Then scrub and olive groves before we passed through Cana where Jesus changed the water into wine at a wedding.  It seems that parties of pilgrims now come to Cana to renew their wedding vows and presumably drink the wine which we were assured, is now very sweet and sickly.

We started to go downhill and after a while I saw a sign saying we were at sea level.   Further down we went till we reached the Sea of Galilee and the town of Tiberius.  This is one of the four holy towns of Israel because so many famous rabbis lived and are buried here.

The hotel is lovely and overlooks the Sea but it went dark so quickly that I shall need to take a photo tomorrow. As I am writing, I can hear somebody practising on a trumpet, never heard that before in a hotel and he's not very good either. 

After a rest, we went down for cocktails and chose a Long Island.  It was so good we asked for another.  Seriously, the barmaid said, Are you sure?  They are very strong.  How little she knows us.  Dinner was very good and we listened to a lady tickling the ivories in the bar before bed.