Up early for breakfast at 6.15 am and departure before 7 am into a lovely cool sunny day. We started with long downhill runs on busy roads to Shoket junction, passing occasional poor Arab villages. Shoket is the junction with the road to Beersheba, but we turned North towards the West Bank, cutting off just before the wire barriers. It’s a lot greener here, several thousand feet above the Dead Sea, at the edge of the Negev.
We followed the fence-line marking the West Bank boundary through a steep wood and then a short stretch of new road before joining the old boundary patrol track. This was rough – great fun bouncing along, watching out for cattle on the road!
Back onto tarmac again, and I waited with the front group while Ami went to round up stragglers. We had stopped at a vineyard growing grapes for eating, rather than for wine-making, if I remember correctly. I was to look out for a guy called Mike who was bringing our lunch.
Mike duly arrived with a car-load of Falafel and cold water – gorgeous! I even attempted a second, which was a mistake. Soon we went on, stopping at Tel Lakhish, where the Assyrians issued our old friend Hezekiah with numerous threats. We continued to a nearly completed motorway to enjoy a smooth few miles into the wind, with a village in the distance: Kiryat Gat, biblical Gath, one of the ancient Philistine cities.
Off the motorway and onto a smaller road into Kibbutz Gal’on, our destination for the night.
This was to be our least comfortable stop. We had shared dorms with four to a room – I was with Donnie, Bob and Ken. Dinner was outside the restaurant: just a bit too cool at this time of year. Mein host was Mike again, a South African exile who had made his home here with his wife. He was loud, and upset Sivan with a rude comment, but kept on bringing delicious dishes to our tables – soup, spiced sausage, salad, sweet potatoes, meat-balls, steak, and so on. It was all a bit much, but the circling mongrels were ever ready for a titbit.
We gathered later in the Kibbutz bomb-shelter for briefing and prayers, and after another whisky nightcap the night was soon filled with the sound of snoring.
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