Friday, April 3, 2009

DAY 7 and DAY 8 LOWER GALILEE and LOTS AND LOTS OF SUN!

Our first stop of our long, but interesting, day in Lower Galilee was Beth Shean which was a political and cultural center for the Romans once upon a time. We looked at old, humungous columns and ancient toilets which were just amazing and then climbed to the top of this hill for a better view of more archaic rocks and ruins. I’m not a huge history buff if you couldn’t already tell from my exhilarating explanation. I am more interested in the spiritual sites that have purpose and meaning to my eternal exaltation. Next we quickly visited Beth Alpha Synagogue to watch a cheesy video and look at a mosaic of Jewish symbols and signs of the zodiac. Gan Ha-Shelosha was our next stop where we got to go swimming in this HUMUNGOUS pool that was absolutely beautiful! The sun was shining, for the most part, so I attempted to get some color on my very pale sun-deprived legs and then we had to leave for Afula to get falafels and ice cream. The box lunches provided by the Kibbutz consist of two loaves of bread, one piece of fruit, and a gross wafer chocolate bar. I’m not into eating massive balls of fat and oil (“falafel”) but I was content with my dark chocolate ice cream bar. Our last two stops of the busy day were Nain, where Jesus Christ raised a widow’s son from the dead, and Mt Tabor which Christians have long since acclaimed to be the site of Christ’s Transfiguration. How amazing it is to sing hymns of praise and speak about these stories and events sitting in the actual places they occurred. These are the sites that really strengthen my testimony and motivate me to study my scriptures with greater purpose. Today was absolutely incredible, like every other day in this gorgeous city, as we had class all morning along the shores of the Sea of Galilee (aka the Sea of Chinneroth, Lake of Gennesaret, or Tiberias). Whichever name you so choose is morally and politically correct. Moving on...the rest of my afternoon from 1pm – 5:45pm was spent reading, writing, talking, and listening to my ipod on the beach in an attempt to finally get some decent sun on my legs. I succeeded to get some color back into them which was incredible and made me so happy! I got lost in my own little world today and imagined myself back in California soaking up the sun at San Clemente beach. It was a very relaxing, mellow, and perfect day to prepare me for my NEXT POST... UPPER GALILEE!

1 comment:

Mom said...

Remember...it's still spring here in Southern California. Not quite beach bathing weather yet. Getting there though & some days have been gorgeous lately! Glad you had some nice memories from home come flooding back to you way over in Galilee!