Okay, this blog is about April 2nd and 3rd, but I'm writing it on April 4th. I'm catching up a bit at a time. But every day I have to go out and see fantastic new things, so it's been tough! (Never has a sentence deserved so little sympathy.)
On Saturday we were enjoying the final day of our Israel tour before heading to Jordan on Sunday. If you've been reading this blog you may start to assume some things. Would we see something with religious significance? Maybe something very, very old? Yes on both counts!
We saw the spot where Jesus was baptized, and the famous ancient city of Caesarea. Then we drove to our hotel in Tel Aviv for our final dinner as a group.
At the southern tip of the Sea of Galilee is a place called Yardenit. It is believed that this is the spot where Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist. There are seven sacraments in the Catholic church: Baptism, Eucharist (Communion), Confirmation, Marriage, Holy Orders, Reconciliation, and Anointing of the Sick. When Martin Luther split from the Catholic Church, creating the Protestant Reformation and Luteranism, resulting in virtually all of the other Protestant denominations to follow, he kept two of the sacraments: Baptism and Eucharist. That's just to say that the Protestants and Catholics, and all the Orthodox Christians, too, really respect the sacrament of Baptism. (Especially the Baptists?) If you'd like to be re-baptized, this is the place to do it. The verses that talk about Jesus's baptism are presented on the grounds in over 80 languages. Pilgrims from all over the world come here for baptisms. Here's one of the ones we saw.
I stood in the waters of the Jordan River where Jesus was baptized!!
The people emerging from the water were filled with joy. It was fun to see.
From the Jordan River we went to Caesarea. This port city was crated by Herod the Great over 2,000 years ago. I wrote about him a bit in the previous blog post. This town looks like an ancient city. Lots of marble columns with corinthian capitals, a theater, a hippodrome, and lots more. Herod built an underwater concrete harbor here, which was the first of its kind in the world. It allowed ships from all over the Mediterranean Sea to stop at Caesarea, which made it an important and lucrative trade stop. This is where we got to walk the city, watch a movie, and enjoy a bagel sandwich.
From there it was on to Haifa, the third largest city in Israel, after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. In Haifa we got to see the shrine to the Bab of the Bahá'í faith. Growing up just north of Chicago, we visited the B'Hai temple in Wilmette fairly often. The Bahá'í temple in Illinois is the only one in North America. There is one per continent (excluding Antarctica). Bahá'u'lláh was the founder of the Bahá'í faith. His history is more than I want to delve into right now, because I've just returned from a rooftop bar after two delicious tropical drinks, and I need to pack before checking out of the hotel at 8am tomorrow. But I will say that all the temples of the B'Hai faith are amazing, and the one in Haifa, Israel is the main temple in the world. It is located at the site where "the Bab" (Bahá'u'lláh) was banished and imprisoned by the Ottoman Empire in 1868. The temple stands in the middle of a hill, with terraced gardens above and below. You can drive to a site far below the temple, or far above the temple, but you can't drive TO the temple. The view from below and above is amazing.
From Haifa we drove to Tel Aviv, where we checked into a hotel that used to be a movie theater. It's the Cinema Hotel, and it's super fun. They had Charlie Chaplain movies projected onto the wall in the lobby. Next to the reception desk was a gigantic projection system from the early days of movie theaters, and it happens to be the original projector from the original theater where we were staying. Throughout the hotel there is memorabilia from the early movie days. Our room had a photo of Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron from An American in Paris. The hallways and dining room had photos, too.
Our hotel in Tel Aviv.
This is one of the projectors from the 4th floor.
The next day we were in the bus and off to Jordan. We went through passport control, got our visas, paid our exit tax, got on a different bus on the Jordan side, and ended up at the Landmark Hotel in Amman. An uneventful day, thankfully. The most significant thing to note is that Ramadan started the day we entered Jordan, so the country is fasting from sunrise to sunset. We stopped at a convenience store because the restaurants are all closed. The first things we saw in Jordan were Coca Cola and McDonalds signs. We hadn't seen any McDonald's restaurants in Israel. (Sorry, Jordan! Be thankful that we haven't exported Taco Bell to you yet!)
At 6:00pm we met the rest of our group. All seven of us from the first week in Israel will continue on to the second week in Jordan. But six others are only doing the Jordan part of the trip, so our group increased from 7 to 13. We all met at the meeting and prepared for a week of what Jordan has to offer.
More on our travel companions later. For now it's time to pack up and get ready for a long drive to Petra and a new hotel tomorrow! G'night!!
