Skip to content

Holy Land Adventure

Ross Family Adventure 2022

Menu
  • About Us
Menu

Sight! Haifa and Akko (Acre)

Posted on June 23, 2022June 23, 2022 by Keryn Ross
Prep for the glasses store. Fortunately unneeded, as she spoke very very good English.

The promised resolution and happy ending: No, we didn’t end up finding my glasses. They are either a) destined for some very near-sighted Egyptian child (given the direction of the longshore drift) or b) going to be found embedded in shelly sandstone by some future archeologist who will use them to date the era in which these were deposited. “Two-thousand-year-old optical polycarbonate!” she will say in excited tones, much like I feel when I see the 2000 year old Roman glass. “This is a significant find!” I’m so glad a part of me will rest forever in the Mediterranean, or at least until my hypothetical archeologist picks it up.

I’m super lucky that my marvelous sister Jen works for the Optical Center at the Payson, Utah Walmart. My eye doctor works at the Lindon Walmart Optical Center, but because of the marvels of computers, Jen could look up my glasses and contacts prescription and send it to me. Also fortunate: my glasses were lost in the evening here in Israel, which is morning in Utah, so Jen was even at work! Quick as could be, she had texted me a picture of my prescriptions, and even had the focal lengths and other arcane and secret numbers. The one concern–my contacts prescription is for fancy astigmatism lenses, and maybe those are harder to come by–couldn’t be fixed yet, because my doctor wasn’t in yesterday to write a normal spherical prescription. But we were going to start with what we had and work through problems if we came on them.

And we didn’t! We decided to drive out to Haifa in the morning as previously planned (to see the Baha’i World Gardens), and find an optometrist there. After driving through some seriously narrow streets, Bradley dropped me off at our Google-discovered optical store. Once I was done, I was to take a taxi over to the gardens, where everyone else was going to spend whatever time I needed at the doctors.

Which only turned out to need about 15 minutes! I walked in, waited a minute for the doctor to finish her phone call, explained the problem (she spoke English, thank heavens!), she looked at the prescription, found the contacts, explained it would take up to two days to make glasses (I decided to just go for the contacts), watched me put the contacts in, gave me a case and fluid, charged me about 180 NIS (about $60 US), and wished me a lovely rest of my trip. It was so awesome, and I can see again.

Baha’i gardens, middle terraces
Baha’i gardens, middle terrace.
Baha’i gardens, looking out toward the port of Haifa, middle terraces.

I decided to walk to the Baha’i Gardens, since it would take me 30 minutes to walk and 26 minutes and more money to take a taxi. The gardens were confusing, unfortunately. They spill down the mountain dramatically, and there are three entrances (top, middle, bottom). But you can’t get from one entrance terrace to another, most of the paths are blocked off, and you can’t really see the place without a tour–which was not obvious from their website, which welcomes all to come tour with a guide or be self-guided. I ended up at the middle terrace entrance, which was lovely, but mostly blocked off.

The rest of the family ended up at the top entrance, which had a great view area but also was mostly blocked by pretty little locked gates. You couldn’t even walk down the flower bed paths up there, and I was able to do a little of that at my area. So it was beautiful, but a little disappointing.

Once everyone piled back into the van and came and fetched me, we decided to go next to Mt Carmel. This turned into an adventure–Mt Carmel is mostly a place with lots of picnic grounds and camping and hiking, and not really a place with a museum or statues, etc (there is one statue of Elijah calling on God to burn the sacrifice, but we never made it over to there). But we kept driving and eventually found a picnic area (once again, practically empty!) with lovely shade and benches and a view.

Hebs telling us the story he researched (probably about 3 or 4 years ago!!!) all about Mount Carmel and Elijah and the priests of Ba’al. We also talked about Elisha and the Assyrian army (“they that be with us are greater than they that be with them” 2 Kings 6), and the widow with her cruse of oil and barrel of meal.

And a makeshift rope swing!!!! This made the trip so worth it for my kids–they laughed and played and just relaxed, which let the adults relax as well. We had a little devotional and talk about the significance of Mt Carmel, but then just had a good time.

The blessed rope swing.
Okay, but what if she falls right on her little head?
Daredevil Hebs on the rope swing.
Daredevil Yummy on the rope swing, shocked and appalled Hebs off on the left.
Daredevil Zee, the biggest daredevil of them all.

After Mt Carmel, hungry and ready for non-scary camping bathrooms, we drove into the ancient Crusader City of Akko (Acre). We found a fun diner/restaurant just inside the city walls, and sat down for late lunch/early dinner.

Gee (fries) and Hebs (ordered shawarma, ate Dad’s schnitzel instead)
Em (schnitzel), Keryn (lamb kebabs), Zee (shawarma).
LaDonna and Bradley, lunch (LaDonna had St. Peter’s fish, Bradley ordered schnitzel but ate Hebs’ shawarma.
Yummy and Eva, lunch (Yummy had schnitzel, Eva had St. Peter’s fish)
Super yummy meal–I have officially decided that hummus is the perfect addition to just about everything. And the preserved cabbage and pickled cucumbers were so good, too!

Most everyone tried something new or at least not normal for us at home, and we shared bites and extras and sauces and generally had a great time. Then we explored Akko for an hour before heading back to the van.

After lunch, we split up–Eva, LaDonna, Bradley, and Gee went to the tip of the Old City of Akko, to see the harbor, while the rest of us walked over to the other side to see the shoreline and walk back to them along the city walls. We found soccer fields, in the Crusader castle moat! Such an awesome use of space.
On Napoleon’s Trail, headed to the city walls of Akko. Yum and Em.
Just outside the city walls, Yum, Zee, Hebs, and Em. I had a picture of Akko in my mind, and I wanted to find that same spot. Quite accidentally, I found it! I love the walls rising up from the sea. We also found many nice shells here!
The lighting isn’t great, but here’s my picture!
Cute kids (but missing my Gee!)
Keryn at Akko
I love the little niches everywhere in the walls. There was a guy in this niche, just out of sight, fishing for his dinner (presumably).
I have no idea how these two guys got out on this rock, but they had the longest fishing pole I have ever seen. The waves splashing up looked liked it was going to knock them off every time.
Despite the numerous signs saying “Do not climb city walls”, these guys were not only climbing the walls, but then jumping off of them. It totally scared and freaked me out–what is that, 10 meters? And there were rocks nearby! And then you had to climb this totally sketchy crusader-age “staircase” jutting out of the wall. And they were egging each other on. Adrenaline rush, I’m sure, but definitely not for me!
Weird little tower-thingie, jutting into the sea.
Headed back to the van parked outside the city walls, hot, tired, but pleased.
My most exciting (okay, not quite, but still really cool) stop of the day–the beach by the River Na’aman. The reason this is exciting is because I teach a lecture about glass making to my Diamonds and Gems students, and I always talk about the Na’aman River.

“The tradition is that a merchant ship laden with nitrum being moored at this place [Belus River, the present day Na’aman River near Akko], the merchants were preparing their meal on the beach, and not having stones to prop up their pots, they used lumps of nitrum from the ship, which fused and mixed with the sands of the shore, and there flowed streams of a new translucent liquid, and thus was the origin of glass.”

History of glass, Wikipedia
Look at these gorgeous ripples from the wind. The sand here is so incredibly fine and soft.
The River Na’aman!
Looking toward the Mediterranean Sea, Na’aman River to the left out of view.
My spoils!
Yummy and I, in a tunnel. On the way out of Haifa heading back to Netanya.

Because it is our last night in Netanya (sniff!), Hebs, Zee, Yum, Bradley, and I all spent it at the beach. It was so gorgeous!

One last evening on the beach, Hebs, Zee, and Yummy.
The sunsets are so breathtaking, I just can’t resist taking a million photos.
Setting sun, June 23, 2022, Ein HaTchelet beach, Netanya.
Millions and millions of photos
This girl! She has been building sand castles at every beach we’ve been to, and they just keep getting better and better.
Midway through the construction process.
Building materials to the left, Dad to the right, ocean in front of her. What more could you possibly want?
Yummy’s finished creation. An absolutely beautiful sand palace.
We’ve been incredibly blessed by the supreme lack of crowds on “our” beach–it’s felt incredibly decadent and almost like cheating!
Purple flag this evening–means jellyfish are afloat and dangerous. The jellyfish in this area won’t kill you, but their sting is painful and uncomfortable. We decided to let the kids swim anyway–there were enough other people in the water that we felt comfortable with that. Hebs may have had a glancing encounter with one–he doesn’t know, but there is a little welt on his arm that is slightly painful. But it also could be a bug bite!
My swimmers. Hebs, Yum, Zee
We found a plumeria blossom on the sidewalk on our walk home. So beautiful.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent Posts

  • 360 Video Clips
  • Homeward Bound (aka The Longest Independence Day Ever)
  • Church of the Holy Sepulcher Solo (Sunday, July 3)
  • Yad Vashem (Sunday, July 3)
  • Our last Shabbat in Jerusalem (Saturday, July 2)

Recent Comments

  1. Telima on Flexibility, flexibility…
  2. Emily Lamas on Timna Park
  3. Keryn Ross on Snorkeling in the Red Sea
  4. Keryn Ross on Eilat
  5. Keryn Ross on Eilat Day Three

Archives

  • September 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022

Categories

  • Preparation
  • Uncategorized
© 2023 Holy Land Adventure | Powered by Superbs Personal Blog theme