Sunday, September 18, 2011

Golan - September 15th-17th, 2011

We met at the Golan Field School in Katzrin on Thursday night.

A description of our route can be found, in Hebrew, here.

On Friday morning, after breakfast, we drove to the lower parking lot of the Hermon site. After the drivers returned from leaving the cars at the end of the trail, we started walking.

Our first stop was The Man Pool, which was dry at this time of year. We heard an explanation about the formation of the pool and the valley where it is situated, and looked at the herd of cows and horses that were grazing near the pool.

We continued our hike along Nachal Ar'ar (Juniper) along the red trail. We saw many cows among the trees.
At first we walked on a paved road, then a wide path and eventually along a narrow path, through the brush.

We climbed to the top (almost) of Har Cachal where we stopped for a snack, and then started down the other side of the hill.

On the way down we stopped at the Chachal mines.Chachal or Galena, was used for makeup and pottery in ancient time.

We continued our decent and came to a jeep trail, on which we continued our hike.

About half way down, a trail split off, and we walked to the remains of a Iturean Temple.

After returning  to the main trail, we continued towards Neve Ativ,

On Friday night, we a had a surprise visit by a scorpion.

On Shabbat, some of us took a walk to Nachal Zavitan, and took a dip in the pools there.

On Shabbat afternnon, some of us went to visit the small zoo adjacent to the field school. As we were leaving, we saw an impressive male Ibex walking around the field school.

That to Yael, our guide, who did a great job, and to everyone who helped organize the weekend.

Pictures:
Gadi's Pictures
Steve's Pictures