South Israel

Visited: February 2022

Duration of visit: 9 days (North and South)

Capital city: Jerusalem

Population: 9.4 million (2022)

• Extreme kindness or unkindness by locals.
• The holy city of Jerusalem, where cultures, religious, past and future have created a fantastic old town.
• Driving to the south through desert countryside filled with palm tree plantations and oases along Dead Sea, where swimming in heavily salty water brings fun and rejuvenation.
• Red Canyon and Timna Valley Park – beautiful work of nature through millions of years left amazing landscape in desert: canyons, pillars, cliffs and rock formations.

In this article I describe the second part of my trip to Israel in 2022 – The South: intertwining of religions, swimming in the Dead Sea and trekking in canyons. More articles about Israel adventures are available here:

If Tel Aviv is a city that never sleeps, Jerusalem is the holiest city in Judaism. I had read a lot about it, watched it in the news (good and bad), but visiting it surpassed all the expectation. I had extensively researched about the city, familiarized with positive and negative reports; however, my visit exceeded all my expectations.

Already when riding a local bus from the central terminal to the apartment, I was observing mind-blowing sceneries of rabbis, pilgrims, Hasidic or orthodox, wearing traditional simple clothes and covered with scarfs, kippots or black hats. Predominantly black and white colored men clothes, while women are known for modest dressing and covering hairs when in the presence of men other than close family members. Beside Jewish, I could notice the presence of many Muslims and Christians from all over the world.

The Old City of Jerusalem is a one square kilometer surrounded by a monumental defensive wall, home to several sites of key importance and holiness to the three major Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

The city has been historically divided into four quarters: Muslim Quarter, the Christian Quarter, the Armenian Quarter and the Jewish Quarter.  There are 8 gates through which people and vehicles can enter the Old City. High security is guaranteed with police and army officers, who are fully equipped and supervise the whole city, especially critical points in Jewish area. Special entrance and check points also lead to the Dome of the Rock, an Islamic shrine located on the Temple Mount.

The Old City is home to several sites of key importance and holiness to the three major Abrahamic religions: The Temple Mount and Western Wall for Judaism, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher for Christianity, and the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque for Islam. The Old City of Jerusalem was added to the World Heritage Site list of UNESCO in 1981.

I found it remarkable how effectively this one square kilometer of land is utilized. During normal times, the city is teeming with pilgrims and tourists who populate the streets. During the early post-Covid era, I hardly spotted any foreign visitors.

Beside all the monuments, quarters, churches, mosques and synagogues there are some secret hidden treasures that I found among the high walls.

The old city has been built and rebuilt in different periods, with many layers that form life on the main streets, underground and also on the roofs.

Climbing the stairs that lead to the roof near the small mosque of Sultan Kahn, I discovered a distinctive location, where more buildings had been raised. In my efforts to follow them, I quickly became disoriented again or found a dead end with no possible way out. Women were getting ready to go to work, children were preparing for school, while the sun was slowly rising. When I ended up near an apartment where it would have been disrespectful to disturb the calm of the morning routine, I decided to move on to more public areas.

For the last part of my trip around Israel, I decided to rent a car. Even though public transport is fantastic and rather inexpensive, there where two main reasons why I opted for this form of travelling: It was Friday and I had learned the lesson that during shabbat public transport doesn’t operate; I was limited in time and wanted to see several natural wonders in a rather big territory with seldom connections by bus.

Funny enough, all car rental companies have the same policy regarding mileage. 250 kilometers per day for the first two days and unlimited mileage from day three up. Since I was going to drive over 800 kilometers, I preferred renting a car for 3 days.

Roads in Israel are in great condition, there is very little traffic outside of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, speed limit does not exceed 90 kilometers per hour and driving is comfortable. After successfully avoiding exclusive bus lanes and cameras in Jerusalem, I continued on Route 1 toward the Dead Sea. The journey to the sea level point is brief, after which the road descends an additional 400 meters in elevation before arriving at the shores of the northern shores of the Dead Sea.

At first, only paid access to the shore was available, so I decided to continue driving on Route 90 along the coast toward the south. It was sunny and warm, when suddenly strong side wind started to blow. Continues quick changes in weather conditions made driving in the next hour extremely difficult and also dangerous.

Due to bad weather a cable car and winding path climb up to the fortification on Masada mountain was closed for the rest of the day.

I only had an opportunity to watch a short movie that explained the history of heroic fights and suicide of the last rebels against Romans at Masada, therefore turning their desperate fight into a symbol of the struggle for freedom. A legendary rebellion that reminds Jews to vulnerability and direct them to be self sufficient and always ready to defend their position, religion and main cause. I will need to come back one day to climb Masada in good weather.

At 420 meters below sea level, the Dead Sea is the lowest point on Earth. The sea contains 31 percent of mineral salts – the highest level of salinity of any body of water in the world.

A perfect beach to swim and observe the salty structure of the sea is Ein Bokek beach – where several hotels, spas and resorts are located. The beach was free, but I had to pay for a parking space.

Swimming in the Dead Sea is a strange experience – the body is actually floating and there is no risk to drawn. Even any style of swimming is hard to perform, since the whole body is pushed to the water surface. When I laid down on the back, I was rather sitting in the water with my arms and legs over the surface. The skin can itch, if any wounds are exposed to salty water, while the feeling is as being greased with oil.

I was desperate for a shower as soon as finishing 15-minutes immersing in the sea. The air and water temperatures in February were remarkably enjoyable. The salt is not only dissolved in the water, but it also forms various structures along the sea and on the ground of the lake. I felt crystals of coarse salt under my feet; it is soft as small pebbles.

On the periphery of Ein Bokek, magnificent peninsulas, characterized by elongated, narrow expanses of salt, are formed. When walking along one of them toward the center of the sea, I observed many forms of salty rocks on the side, while bright white color was reflecting from the surface of clear water and cocoa colored background of deserted mountains around.

I reached one of the most easily accessed hiking trails in all Israel twenty minutes driving north of Eliat: Red Canyon is not only beautiful, but also free and accessible all year round. Even though it was a weekend, I didn’t notice many people, while climbing, walking and posing through the canyon. The rock is varied in color, predominantly brown to red and in patches is shades of white and yellow. From atop this rock there is one of the most perfect photo spots in the area, with a fantastic wadi in the background.

The road to Red Canyon leaded me very close to the Egyptian border, where strong metal fence is winding up the valley separating both countries. It includes cameras, radars and motion detectors, which are additionally supported by constant supervised of Israeli soldiers.

The 245-kilometre barrier, stretching from Eilat in the south to the Gaza – Israel border in the north, took three years to construct at an estimated cost of half a billion US$, making it one of the largest projects in Israel’s history.

The main objective of the barrier was originally planned in response to the high levels of illegal African migrants and later needed to protect Israeli lifestyle and general security. For as long as my eye could see, there was a nice secondary road, suitable for bicycles, running only a few meters awy from to the fence.

Timna Valley is rich in copper ore, amazing geology and fabulous landscape. The main visitors in the past were copper miners (back to 5,000 BC), while today the main attraction is Timna Valley Park, where ancient history, breathtaking landscape, and unique geology attracts visitors. The road system inside the park is extremely well organized and enables to drive around in a normal sedan car.

With more than 20 trekking trails there are many opportunities for hiking and biking, but also many options with an easy access to the main attractions. I was driving from one point of interest to the other and walking to the natural monuments on short hikes. Private transport is definitely needed, either a car or a bike that can be rented at the visitor center. There is a dozen of different structures to observe. The most beautiful to me were the following three:

• Mushroom Rock – a short trail took me to a giant monolithic, red sandstone rock of mushroom-shape, known as a hoodoo.
• Solomon Pillars – the last stop in the late afternoon, when they shine in red – brown colors. Awesome natural structures were created by centuries of water erosion through fractures in the sandstone cliff.
• Arches – natural arches are particularly fascinating due to a steep decline through a small valley in the backside. Copper mine shafts are in the neighborhood, but I didn’t have time to visit them.

After visiting Timna Valley Park I continued driving to Be’er Sheva. Good road leads through deserted countryside with little population and plenty of army training fields on both sides. The main attractions are road signs warning to avoid entering in military zones, tanks crossings and camels on the road. I preferred not stopping much on the way until just before the sunset I reached Mitzpe Ramon – Ramon Lookout.

Is there a better place to enjoy sunset than top of the cliff on the northern ridge at an elevation of 860 meters overlooking the world’s largest erosion cirque, known as the Makhtesh Ramon? I don’t think so.

I could feel colder air when the sun was slowly going down and desert-dwelling goat Nubian ibex were walking in precipice hundred-meter bellow, while I was sitting on the edge of the cliff observing the valley of Makhtesh Ramon. A wonderful ending of a beautiful day that connected me to deserted nature of Israel.