Back to Israel (after a pause)

Day 8. Bike Ride Day 3.

Up bright and early (5.30 am) – I’m glad for all the early starts I had during my training – and most of us met up at the beach for communion by the shore. Gordon led the service simply but movingly.

Then it was off to pack up and get breakfast. We were keen to get off sharply, but a call of nature left me trailing from the start.

It was a perfect start in the cool of the morning, being on the shaded side of the lake; soon we reached a small town where the Jordan leaves the Sea of Galilee, and we turned South into the valley. At first we were on a cycle track next to a leafy boulevard, which was lovely, but once out of town we were on the hard shoulder once more, and the road began to go up and down a bit. I dropped back into the centre group as we climbed to the side of the valley and then we gathered again beside a quarry. As we slaked our gathering thirst and enjoyed some fruit, we looked straight up 600metres to our next stop: the crusader fortress at Belvoir. I don’t think the picture captures the scale very well…

This was a hard slog for us all. Most of us (including me) had to push our bikes up some of the steeper bits, and a few had to take a lift in the vans (not me). It was only 75 minutes – which wasn’t a bad time for the climb – but we were grateful for another break under the shade of olive trees near the summit.

We took some time out to see the ruins of the fortress (the Jordan valley and the hills of the country called Jordan are just visible in the haze in the background) and then took the agricultural track on the more gentle slope Westwards. This was great fun, as long as you stood off the saddle! In the middle of a field we had to splash through a deep drain – I got thoroughly spattered. Ami said ‘That wasn’t there last week!’

We arrived at a viewpoint opposite Mount Gibeah, and Ami asked me to read the death of Saul and David’s lament from 1 Samuel 31 and 2 Samuel 1.

It was a fast exit from the viewpoint back down to the valley, we crossed a main road and continued round to Sachne for a great lunch – salmon fillets, roast veg, warm bread and salad – and a swim in the stream pools there. This was a bit surreal, as the fish in the pools nibbled our toes! Nothing painful – just a cleaning nibble, I think.

Then it was a coach transfer down the Jordan valley, so that we didn’t have to cycle through the West Bank, to get to Kibbutz Kalia at the North end of the Dead Sea. Our chalets here are air-conditioned, but eventually I turned ours off – it was so noisy I couldn’t sleep. The meal in the communal dining room was basic but good. By this stage there isn’t much we wouldn’t eat…