Snow followed by almond blossoms

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Those puffs of white and pink?   
Yes!--they are almond blossoms!
The trees on the mountain are starting to bloom.
Click once or twice on the photo and feast your eyes. 

And to think, just 25 days ago that same view across the valley looked like this.
Covered in snow. 

You can't help but love the Jerusalem Hills. 
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(A post for Our World Tuesday.)

Just go over!

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Today the blessed sun returned after our six straight days of rain.

The unusual heavy wetness  was too much for this ancient agricultural terrace wall, and the stones collapsed onto  a section of  green-and-white-marked hiking trail in our valley.

I prayed the heavy rocks would not start falling again as I was climbing over.

It reminded me that the Rebbe Maharash (of Chabad) had this saying:
"The whole world says, if you can't go under, go over.   
I say, forget going under, just go over!"
 
Meaning that often there is no time or energy or need for painstakingly working through a problem, so we should  jump to the most direct, simple, and powerful solution and just DO it.
Usually this is the most outrageous solution to the challenge, but that's OK. 

Just start by stepping right over it, as though there were no obstacle to begin with.

Maybe that’s why obstacles are there in the first place--so we will go higher. 

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Gateway to nowhere

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Abandoned pillars of an old gateway. 

One of the mysteries in the wilderness valley where I often hike, right below my village. 
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The January sky above the Jerusalem Hills is for SkyWatch Friday.
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Thankful today for quiet in the sky

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Have no illusions, it is not the path to peace.
But today's ceasefire is a welcome relief from the week-long conflict.

Today the sky over my village  was so quiet!
No more fighter jets thundering,  no army helicopters to the hospital helipad, no rockets going over, no air raid sirens.
The quiet of the sky--a blessing to give thanks for day by day, not something to be taken for granted.

To all my family and friends and blog friends in America, happy Thanksgiving Day!
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(A post for SkyWatch Friday.)
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BTW, the photo shows the path I walk if I miss the infrequent bus to my moshav/village.  It is only 35-40  minutes brisk walk  from the city limits of Jerusalem to my home in the Jerusalem Hills.
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Peace and solitude in the valley

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Is it a mourning dove?
This sweet bird didn't fly away when she saw me on my evening walk in the valley.
Maybe she knew we were birds of a feather.

Can you see her above the summer dryness of the Jerusalem Hills?
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The dove is for Camera Critters and the dry grasses are for Summer Stock Sunday.
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It is a big and sad contrast. Just a few hours drive to the south and west of here, missiles and rockets from Gaza are falling on Beersheba and communities of the Western Negev and on the Mediterranean coast cities of Ashdod and Ashkelon since yesterday.
This is the Palestinian reaction to Israel's retaliation on Gaza terrorist centers.
Our Air Force strikes came after Thursday's deadly terror strikes on the road to Eilat.
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Creepy cistern

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Welcome to ABC Wednesday C-Day.

I always wondered what was in the big (260 dunams) empty nature place locals call Gazelle Valley.
It, and what was originally a herd of 17 Gazella gazella gazella, is surrounded by Jerusalem urban development.
On one side is a fire station, seen in the first photo.
But when I was roaming there exactly a year ago, much of the land was charred black from a recent brush fire.

Within sight of the Fire Department, I was surprised to discover one still-standing long-abandoned stone house almost overgrown by trees and weeds.

Caution to the wind, I came closer to snap a photo of the interior.
From outside, that is; I wasn't cuckoo enough to find a way in. No.

Through the basement window I cringed to see a ghostlike drape hanging on the wall.

Courageous or crazy?
Had I gotten too close to this hole in the ground, something might have crumbled or collapsed.
And then only the jackals would have found me--for dinner.

The thick plaster lining of the hole made me think this was once a cistern, now a creepy cistern.
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Urbex/UE/urban exploration could be fun, but not when one is alone and without a cellphone.
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The place just right

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My little village on the hill, beneath a big sky.
As seen from the valley below, where I often go walking toward evening, meeting only jackals on the way.
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For SkyWatch Friday.
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Heavenly shades of night are falling . . .

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The last half hour of direct sunlight on the valley and the Jerusalem Hills and on Jerusalem itself, as the sun starts to go down behind my hill.
"Heavenly shades of night are falling . . . "
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For SkyWatch Friday.
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Bridge over the river Soreq

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Recently you saw the modern train station in Tel Aviv and also the inside of an Israel Railways train.
Now let's take that train up to Jerusalem.
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When the Tel Aviv-Jaffa to Jerusalem railway was opened in 1892, it saw the Middle East's first train.
The journey of 82 km (50 miles) then took 4 hours.
Today it is "only" about one hour and 45 minutes.
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One single track goes all that way, with a few places where one train can pull over and wait for another train coming from the opposite direction to pass.
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While my train stood off to the side, near the old and now roofless Bar Giora train station, a group of school kids came by, on their spring hike through the Soreq Valley to see the almond trees in bloom.
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A delight to see the kids out in nature!
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But I was overjoyed to see that they were crossing a BRIDGE, something to post for Sunday Bridges meme!
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The metal bridge is narrow, enough for just one person, and appeared to be less than two meters above the fast-flowing Nahal Soreq river.


The Soreq drains the Jerusalem Hills west of Jerusalem and ends in the Mediterranean Sea.
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Wet fur coats



Wet mother and daughter at dinner

 For six  of the last eight days it has been raining.
The aquifers and the Sea of Galilee, the plants and the earth all love the long-awaited water.
But my neighbors'  outdoor cats hate the wet and cold.  

The clouds sit not just on top of the mountains, they creep down to the valley and into  ravines.

I know Israel needs the rain, but like the cats, I will be happy to see and feel some sunshine again.

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My  feline  friends are posted for Camera Critters weekend meme.

The bridge that carried water over Gehennom

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Last week the big news broke of the discovery of this aqueduct bridge that crosses Jerusalem's Hinnom Valley (Gei Hinnom).
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This photo from the 1880s shows the arches already partly covered.
(The Citadel/Tower of David and Jaffa Gate are in the background.)
Sometime in the early 20th century the area was filled and the beautiful stone bridge was totally covered and eventually forgotten.
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April 27 photograph by Assaf Peretz, courtesy of the IAA

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The Gihon waterworks company was digging, doing work on sewers, when they stumbled upon the old bridge.
The Israel Antiquities Authority stepped in and started excavating.
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Photo by Assaf Peretz, courtesy of IAA
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This is part of the Lower Aqueduct, first built in the Hasmonean period.

Miles of channels, tunnels, and aqueducts carried water to Jerusalem and to the Temple Mount from Solomon’s Pools, south of Bethlehem.

The ingenious system kept on working till the start of the 20th century.

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The bridge was built in 1320 CE (in the Mamluk period) by Sultan Nasser al-Din Muhammed Ibn Qalawun, as evidenced by the dedicatory inscription set in it (visible in the historic photo above).

However, it was apparently constructed to replace an earlier bridge dating to the time of the Second Temple period that was part of the original aqueduct.

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The IAA website says, "The Israel Antiquities Authority, in cooperation with the Nature and Parks Authority, is working to expose the entire length of the arched bridge, conserve it and integrate it in the framework of the overall development of the Sultan’s Pool, as part of underscoring the importance of the water supply to Jerusalem in ancient times."

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So far, two of the original nine arches have been excavated to their full height of about three meters.

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UPDATE Jan. 5, 2014: 
See also  http://www.israeldailypicture.com/2014/01/funny-it-doesnt-look-like-mountain-or.html
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A sukkah with a view

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October, but it still feels and looks like summer. SkyWatch Friday visitors have been seeing blue skies at Jerusalem Hills Daily Photo for half a year now. Ho hum . . .
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Israel did do one autumn-like thing however, and that was to end Daylight Saving Time two weeks ago already. Night comes so soon now.
The photo shows the 5:30 pm sky, looking east.

(Click to enlarge--the photo may remind you of a Christmas card.)

Last evening I was invited to a big sukkah and to get there I ventured into Abu Tor for the first time.

Now officially known in Hebrew as Givat Hananya, Abu Tor is a neighborhood on the seam.

The 1948-1967 cease-fire line bisected it.

Abu Tor continues to be a mixed neighborhood. Arabs live on the slope and Jews (as well as many international Christians) live on the top.

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The photo looks toward the (mostly) Arab (but increasingly Jewish) village of Silwan/Siloam/Kfar HaShiloach.

On the horizon is the Mount of Olives.

The other spectacular views from Abu Tor were Mount Zion and the illuminated YMCA and King David Hotel.

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The road below runs through Gai Ben Hinnom, which is Hebrew for the Valley of Hinnom's Son. Gai Hinnom came into other languages as Gehinom or Gehenna and over the years became associated with hell or purgatory.

I didn't go there last night.

Maybe one bright day I will.

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Sunup

It is always a glorious moment when the first rays of sun break onto the terraced hill opposite our hill, across the Soreq Valley.

This photo came to life at 6:53 a.m.

The shadow line made by our hill quickly goes down down down and then the whole valley is in sunlight.

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The SkyWatch Friday group offers sun, moon, clouds, and/or blue skies from all around the planet. Some 350 choices. Join us!

Where the sun stood still

Once you go down from Jerusalem and the surrounding Jerusalem Hills, the lowland of the Shefelah opens up with vistas like this. I snapped this shot from the Jerusalem-to-Tel Aviv bus last Friday.
This bridge goes over the Valley of Ayalon, famous from the book of Joshua 10:12-14 where Joshua needed victory over the Amorites and said, "Sun, stand thou still at Gibeon, and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ayalon." And they did, the Bible says, for about a whole day.
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Bridges and tunnels are being built for a new railway from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. It will be Israel's first high-speed rail and also our first electrified heavy railway line. If the line is ever finished, the trip should take only 28 minutes.
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SkyWatch Friday is in full swing. Have a look.

Weekend drivers

From the west side of our hill you can look down on this road. It winds through the Soreq Valley. On Friday afternoons and Saturday mornings during the summer it is a Mecca for motorcyclists. Click on the photo to see how numerous they are!
The sound the engines make, reverberating off the steep stony walls of the narrow valley, always seems in sharp contrast to the quiet, relaxed atmosphere of Shabbat.
Religious Jews do not drive on Shabbat and many non-religious stay around home to rest. Public transportation does not run either. So the bikers pretty much have the road to themselves.
BTW, in Israel we do not have Sunday off. Sunday is just the first day of the work week.

(Same road without zoom)

I haven't heard them much this autumn. But today is (and all week was) unseasonably warm, a sunny 24 C or 75 F, and the bikers are out in full force to feel the sun and wind on their face.

Mist in the morning light

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The wonderful SkyWatch offers celestial beauty from around the globe from over 300 bloggers. Visit http://skyley.blogspot.com/ to follow the links.

For several mornings now the Soreq Valley below our little mountain village has been full of lovely soft mist. This was my view to the west at 6:15 a.m.
Now it is night, Erev Shabbat. Wishing you all Shabbat shalom, Sabbath peace.

Ktalav, again

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Oh cool! Glad you all liked the ktalav or Arbutus trees.
Here are some bonus shots of some others who live not far from me.
Perched high above the valley road down in Nachal Soreq.

The branches have a tendency to swirl.

This one growing between a rock and a hard place always inspires me.


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How Green Was My Valley

The now-white almond trees and the white boulders and terrace walls give some "relief" from the ubiquitous green of the valley.