Haifa and Galilee in Israel.

Israel welcomed us with unopened arms--our chaotic 1.5 hour wait for a taxi was one of our least favorite experiences.  We put our name on a list but were continuously bypassed for others who "spoke" the language.  I got aggressive and tried to bypass the people who "appeared" to be in charge and we were finally summoned to a taxi.  It was totally crazy with no organization whatsoever and a lot of yelling amongst the supposed organizers.  Once we got a taxi, we asked him to take us to our the Hertz rental car office 20-30 minutes from the port.  They were very nice at the rental car place but we were very glad we took the maximum insurance as they instructed us how to protect ourselves and our car since terrorists steal the rental cars and equip them with car bombs.  Scary!

Once we got our car, we started on our drive to the area called Galilee where Jesus performed most of his earthly mission.  The locations are not in order but I will do my best to describe them.

Our first stop was the Mount of the Beatitudes where Jesus gave his famous Sermon on the Mount.  The picture above is looking up on the mountain from the sea area below.  The site has various buildings including a church and gift shop now and is beautifully maintained.  There are some additional pictures towards the end of this post.

Tabgha is the name of the place where they believe Christ performed the miracle of the bread and fishes and fed the 5,000.  There is a small church built near this area dedicated to St. Peter.  The tourist area allows one to go right down to the Sea of Galilee.  We had visited Capernaum earlier and hiked boulders down to the sea not realizing that we would have this easy opportunity later.  Ha on me!

Capernaum is the place where Peter lived.  Christ spent a lot of time there and chose several of his apostles from this area.  There are archaeological ruins there from Christ's time and beyond.  The photo above with Steve in it shows the original foundation of the temple that was there during Christ's lifetime.

This shows the ruins of the foundation of Peter's house.  A synagogue has been built over the top but they left this viewpoint to preserve the history.

Sea of Galilee at Capernaum.

As we left Capernaum, we purchased fresh pomegranate juice from a local stand.  It was expensive at $5 per cup so we shared one.  We wanted to experience the local culture and get ripped off like other tourists.  The juice was tasty though.

Here is a picture of the Jordan River as it divides the East and West Bank in northern Galilee.  There were no boundary markers, so we didn't linger in the area.  We didn't want to get ourselves into any trouble.

 More pictures of the Sea of Galilee from the local sites.

Below is the Basilica of Annunciation in Nazareth.  It is one of two churches contending for the honor of being built on the sit where Mary received her visit from the Angel Gabriel to tell that she was to be the mother of the Son of God who would be called Jesus.  The other church is St. Gabriel's Church and we didn't see it.  The Basilica is gorgeous and we have a few pictures below.

This courtyard walls were covered by Mosaic art from many countries.  There was nothing representing the U.S.

The outside courtyard of the Basilica is very near the Church of St. Joseph.  It is purported to have been built over the site of Joseph's carpentry shop.  It is a much more modest church and their are stairs going down to lower level sites.

Near both churches there are excavation sites showing foundations from the ancient Village of Nazareth going way back before Christ's birth. The streets were very narrow in Nazareth.  Steve did not enjoy driving and parking on them.  Many were so narrow that only one car at a time could go through so you had to back up if you met another vehicle.

We felt fortunate to find a street near the churches to park our car while we explored the area. The Basilica was only a couple of blocks away.  Below on the right you see a typical narrow one-vehicle street in Nazareth.

These two photos below were taken of the hillsides are we drove toward Jerusalem.  We drove through the congested area of Cana and saw a touristy sign and place from our car where people were lined up to see where Christ turned the water into wine.  It was generally not a nice area and we opted to drive on past.

Tabgha is the area where the miracles of the loaves and fishes supposedly took place.  There are additional photos above.

The next four photos are additional pictures taken in Capernaum.  We really enjoyed our visit there.

These photos were taken at the Mount of the Beatitudes which was our first stop in Galilee.  I picture the area behind me as a possible place where the people sat and listened to the Savior.  The Sea of Galilee is the hazy area where the land ends.

This photo was taken from the ship as we cruised into Haifa.  The building with the dome is the famous Baha'i World Center built on Mount Carmel.  Haifa is a major mediterranean seaport and is a place where Jacob Spori, my great grandfather baptized the first member of the church in Israel in modern times, Johann Georg Grau on Aug. 29, 1886.  He and his wife are buried in Haifa.  We would have liked to visit the cemetery but with such little time to spend, we wanted to see the places where Christ taught, walked and performed his miracles.

This is the modern city of Haifa.  Below is a mosque we saw as we traveled from Haifa to Galilee.  There were many mosques in Israel.