Sartaba - January 30th, 2015

We met at the Sartaba trail head.
On the way there we past a herd of sheep and goats walking along the road up to the trail head. The dogs protecting the herd did not want us to go through, but we convinced them to let us continue.

We started climbing up towards the Sartaba along the green trail.
Our first stop was a lookout towards the north east, The Yabok crossing, one of the Jordan River crossings. The Adam Bridge was used to transfer merchandise back and forth to Jordan, but today it is not active, In the past, it was a major crossing.

Our next stop, after we 'lost' the trail, and then found it again, was near one of the water cisterns that stored water for the fortress at the top. We caught our breath, and then continued up the hill. When we got to the black trail, we took it up to the top of the hill.

The top of the hill has remains of the fortresses (One Hasmonean, and one Herodian). They have not been thoroughly excavated, so there is not much to see. We had a great lookout of the whole area, including remains of the aqueduct that brought water to the fortress.

We descended along the black trail to remains of a Herodian terrace where we found heart shaped pillar segments that were used as the corner columns of a terrace.

We retraced our path along the green trail, and took it to the other side of the hill. Most of the group took a detour to see the siphon that brought water across a valley.

Next, we took the red jeep trail down to the valley, and then the green trail up to our cars and the end of our hike.

Thanks to Elana for organizing the hike and to Allen our guide.

Pictures:
Gadi's Pictures