Day 13: July 12, Caesarea Maritima & The Valley of Meggido

Time is passing by too too fast!!  Today is the week that we left Jerusalem to come and visit beautiful Galilee.  On the way to the beautiful city of Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee, we stopped by Cesarea Maritima, a beautiful small city right by the ocean where they used to have sporting events and horse races.  We went to go observe some of the architectural and archealogical sites and then we were able to enjoy the nice ocean water.  I had never heard of the place, but it was really wonderful. 

Then we stopped by one of my favorite places, the valley of Meggido, because this is the site that the Book of Revelation talks about "Armageddon".  So this is the place where the final battle of the end of the world is supposed to take place.  Let me tell you, it's beautiful, but it's not that dramatic of a place.  This site has some importance in the geography because it's right in the middle of a trade route.  That means, people from Africa and the Middle East would have passed through this valley in order to trade and buy products.  Therefore, we stopped by an ancient military fort that was meant to control the people who were traveling through the valley.  It was very windy and we were able to get some great pictures. 

Later on we also visited Mt. Carmel, where I was able to pray, enjoy the view and take some pictures.  The mountain is smaller than I imagine and there is still a group of carmelite nuns there keeping their tradition of contemplative prayer. 

The nicest surprise was arriving at our hotel in Tiberias, a city of about 100,00 people.  Our hotel is right on the ocean and we are able to swim in either the pool or the lake.  I can't wait to show you more pictures.  Unfortunately, the internet is slow here so I cannot load as many pictures as I would like on Flickr.com 

Thank you for your patience and for following my blog!!