Haifa to Nazareth to Safed

Baha’i Gardens

It’s hot and sunny. Another beautiful day.

Tap water is fine to drink in Israel. Vince started drinking it as soon as we arrived in Israel with no bad effect so we are now all drinking from the tap.

We check out of our apartment and pack our car and then take a short walk to the Louis Promenade which overlooks Haifa and the sea. From this vantage point we have gorgeous views of the city below and the Baha’i Gardens. The Bahai are a religious sect headquartered in Haifa. Their temple is surrounded by extensive gardens that run up the hillside.

We walk back to the car and drive down and park at the bottom of the Baha’i Gardens to get the view looking up the hill. They are stunningly gorgeous with the Baha’i founder’s shrine in the centre.

The German Colony area is right in front of the Gardens. We stop for a coffee….they don’t seem to have a lot of the things listed on the menu.

Arab Quarter

Next area to explore is the Arab Quarter which has a tiny restaurant called Falafel Michelle with the world’s best falafel according to our guidebook. The very modest looking place has one table for dining in so everyone must grab a falafel to go. The owner gives us a sample of his falafel. Delish! The table is free so we sit for a quick lunch … Em and Vince share one as do John and I.

Trying to Get to a Beach

It is really hot and we decide to head to the beach before we go to Nazareth. We drive around and enter the parking lot for a beach called “Quiet Beach”. We pull our bathing suits out of our suitcases and start walking to the beach. The parking lot attendant runs out of his booth and advises “Women only beach!”

We pile back into the car. John’s navigational device is wonky again. We get back onto the highway and drive to Carmel Beach.

This beach is an all gender beach and is awesome. We bounce and bob in the warm waves for an hour before jumping back in the car and heading to Nazareth.

Church of the Annunciation

Nazareth is a big, traffic clogged city with lots of burger joints. We are finally in the area of the Church off the Annunciation and miracle of all miracles, we find a convenient parking spot.

The Church (also called a basilica) is very modern and there is Ava Maria symbolism everywhere. There are also renditions of Mother Mary from all over the world. Unfortunately we didn’t find one from Canada.

Once in the church we file past the cave where Mary was informed by the angel Gabriel that she was going to give birth to the Savior.

Around Nazareth

We next visit the Church of St Joseph where Joseph had his carpenter’s shop. There are a lot of ancient ruins of homes below ground level.

We make our way through the city to the Orthodox Church of the Annunciation. We take a shortcut through an old graveyard which is filled with garbage, graffitti and unpleasant smells…a very sad place.

Unfortunately the Orthodox Church closed at 1pm.

We head back to the Church of the Annunciation where we take some video before heading back to the car.

Safed

There are many ways to spell the name of the city of Safed, also known as Zefat or Tzefat.

Driving to Safed is a bit crazy but Vince does an amazing job. Safed is a city with a lot of steep hills high up on a mountain. There is a large community of Orthodox Jews so everything closes down from sunset on Friday until sunset on Saturday.  We need to make sure we have food to eat for that period.

Our hotel is in the artist’s area of Safed and it is in an old building but decorated very nicely. Em and Vince have their own room with a balcony and we have our own room with a livingroom area and we share a kitchen area in between the two rooms.

It is dark when we arrive so after checking in we walk the town a bit and get a few groceries. There are a bunch of young men having some kind of party with loud Israeli techno pop music next door. Em and Vince see a bunch of them out back smoking cigarettes. I hope they don’t party all night.

The music goes off at 11pm sharp, and we head to bed.