Israel 2013: Cold water, hot sand, and a burger

This past weekend (Friday and Saturday) I was in Haifa with some friends. Haifa is on the coast just north of Tel Aviv. My only goal was to step foot in the Mediterranean and lay on the sand...mission accomplished. We met at 6:30 in the morning outside our apartments in the Student Village, and then we walked to the light rail stop and took the lightrail to the central bus station to take a bus to Haifa, which took about an hour and a half. The closer we got to our destination, the more I realized I was in a hurry to get there and do nothing. Once we arrived in Haifa, we had to take a taxi from the bus station to our hostel/guest house.

Our nice taxi driver

Our Hostel

It just so happened that on our way to the bus station in Jerusalem, we received an email informing us we would be needing our passports. Well, one out of six had theirs. I was not one of them. So when we arrived to the hostel, we explained our situation, but passports were needed in order to avoid the sales tax (Israeli citizens are required to pay the tax). I and another friend were able to email our scanned passports to the hostel while standing there at the desk (thankfully I had scanned mine and emailed it to myself prior to leaving for Israel). So that saved us some money. But that was secondary…I wanted to get to the beach.

Waiting on the train to go to the beach

From the hostel we walked to the train station to get catch a ride to the beach; otherwise it would have been a lengthy walk. It was nearing 90 degrees and we didn’t want to mess with that. The train fare was only 5 shekels (6.60 for the bus within town) and was much nicer and faster than the bus. Within 15-20 minutes of being seated on the train, we were standing on Camel Beach. The water is beautiful—blue and clear. And cold. I waded to my knees and happily made my way back to the warm sand. One of my favorite things about the beach was the food. I’ve been struggling with serious red meat withdrawal, so I eagerly ordered a burger with fries and a Pepsi (no Coke :( ). After ordering we made our way back to our bench in the sand. A little later the waitress brought us our food, and we ate lunch on the beach facing the water. My burger seemed like a half pound, and on the side was a whole sliced tomato, along with a whole pickle, also sliced. It was so much I barely made a dent in my fries, but thankfully I had help.

Red meat!!!

I'm still loving where my feet take me

After lunch a few of us walked along the shoreline, and I made sure to stay close enough to the water to feel the tide coming in on my bare feet. We only had about 2 hours’ worth of sun before it turned hazy; it does that a lot here. Regardless, it was still hot.

Enjoying the view

We left the beach around 4 in order to catch a bus back to the hostel. Three of us were sharing a room with five other girls, and the other half of our group was sharing another room. I opted to take a shower later, so I lay down on my midget bed. Two hours later I realized I had fallen asleep. I groggily walked downstairs for some fresh air. The hostel had a nice seating area outside, with palm trees, flowers and various other plants surrounding on three sides. I sat there for a while as the sun disappeared (and called my mom, of course), then made my way inside to find out what we were doing for dinner. We walked to the main road, which leads to the front gate of the Baha’i Gardens. The restaurants, which line the street, had their menus posted outside, which made our selection much easier. We decided on Havana Plus. I continued my red meat trend by ordering a roast beef sandwich, accompanied by the best Israeli salad I’ve had since arriving here. And I got my Coke :) The atmosphere was very laid back and serene. The seating area was outside, with a roof over our heads supported by wooden poles. After dinner we walked up the street to the gate of the Baha’i Gardens. The cold front had arrived so we began our journey back to the hostel.

Baha'i Gardens at night

Sitting area at hostel

Mural of Baha'i Gardens, seen from sitting area at hostel

The next day (Saturday) we walked back to the gate in front of the Baha’i Gardens for a tour. They informed us we had to make our way up “some stairs” to reach the entrance for the tour. They failed to mention the entrance is at the top of Mt. Carmel. Those stairs (two flights total) were each several hundred feet in length and very steep. Once we conquered the second flight, we then had to walk up the steep incline along the street. We had a small window of time in order to accomplish this, as the tour started at noon, so this was not a leisurely walk. One of the girls in our group had to stop; she physically couldn’t go any further. I didn’t blame her. I’m all for exercise, but this was ridiculous. A friend and I volunteered to stay behind with her, willing to miss the tour. At that point it didn’t matter to me if I saw the garden or not. I was content with the prospect of finding a flat area to lie down in the sun, using my backpack as a pillow. And that’s exactly what I did. For about 5 minutes. As the two girls in our new little group were admiring the view of the Mediterranean from on high, one of the guys in our group called, begging us to take a taxi so we could take the tour with them. So I got up, grabbed my pillow and flagged down a taxi.

Starting our journey from the hostel to the gardens

At the bottom of Mt. Carmel, the Baha'i Gardens, before the trek uphill

Making the ascent up one of many, many stairs; the car at the bottom is where we started

The amazing view from the (almost) top

22 shekels and 5 minutes later, we were cutting in front of people in line to start the tour (how Israeli of us!). The gardens are beautiful and whoever designed them really appreciated clean lines and vivid color. I appreciated it as well. The tour took us back down the mountain we had just climbed, and the garden area at the bottom was my favorite—lots of trees, green grass, cactus, flowers, and statues. After leaving the gardens, we stopped at a bench on the sidewalk to eat lunch, which consisted of hard boiled eggs and clementines from breakfast. Unfortunately I was the one in charge of the eggs. They might have been inside my backpack. That I used for a pillow. I will just say they were still edible, just not pretty. After eating we walked to the German Colony to browse the Arab market; it was a baby shuk. Eventually we went back to the hostel to gather our things and we walked to the bus stop to begin our journey back to Jerusalem.