The last few days in Israel were a bit of a blur for me as my health was not good and I was sleeping very little. Kind of a sad way to end the race, but I was grateful to still see a bit more of Israel despite my lagging body.
(These are LOADED date palms on the drive through the carmel mountains.)
After seeing Nazareth we drove about an hour to a Kibbutz near Hannah's relatives where we spent two nights. This was very close to Mount Carmel and I was thinking and reading about Elijah as we were there.
Anita in front of our tiny cabin and below is the breakfast spread.
It is an area with more trees so I could imagine that it was pretty easy to obtain wood for those big fires that Elijah and the prophets of Baal built! The huge sky was blue and I was also imagining Elijah sitting there and praying after he had told the King that it would rain. Such faith. He told the King it would rain and THEN he went and sat on the mountain praying for the rain, telling that servant to go and check for clouds over and over again. Interesting order of events. "Faith is the
evidence of things hoped for, the substance of things not yet seen..."
We drove to Haifa with Hannah's sweet auntie and enjoyed an afternoon in the sunshine on the beautiful beach. This is where we drank our last cup of fresh squeezed pomegranate juice. Oh so yummy! We stayed to watch the sun set.
Sadly, I was feeling so poorly that I missed out on the family times with Hannah's relatives and spent the time resting instead. I just can't keep up physically with everyone else and I have to be ok with that, but it's hard letting people down and feeling like you are the "problem child" that needs all this extra help. If it was only myself that was getting "put out" it wouldn't be nearly so bad, but being the one that everyone else has to cater to is truly very difficult on the nerves. Oh well. Hannah was ever so gracious and she prayed for me in this regard.
We drove through Ceasarea on our way to Tel Aviv and I was mesmerized by the ruins there. Wanted to badly to get out of the car to go and see the ampitheatre on the water's edge but it wasn't really in the agenda. The area was beautiful and I was so happy that we at least drove through it though so I could have another picture in my mind as I read through the Word to put events into an actual location. Later at the hotel,Hannah read to me out of the book of Acts about Paul being imprisoned there for 2 years.
I just snapped these pics as we were driving through Caesarea, so they don't portray the beauty of the ancient oceanside port at all.
The weather was getting progressively stormier as we drove on and by the time we got into Tel Aviv the wind was raging and the rain was pouring down. Anita was an amazing driver and navigator on those busy narrow streets with honking cars. I would never have wanted to deal with that kind of traffic but she was a trooper.
Tel Aviv was fun - right on the ocean and the wind and waves were wonderful. We took a walk on our last night in Israel and enjoyed the beach, listening to a group drumming and watching the beautiful sunset. We missed the actual Shabbat Celebration at the hotel which was my last chance to have one during my time there but we did get to enjoy the meal and a Messianic worship service following. Beautiful to hear the songs sung in Hebrew with Hannah interpreting for me.
The next day dawned bright and beautiful. We had a delicious breakfast at our rooftop cafe and then we headed to the ocean side for some time in the sun before we packed up one last time. The beach area in Tel Aviv is truly amazing. Such a progressive city with bikes to rent, lots of space to walk and wheel, grassy areas, beach tables and chairs and since there was lots of wind we enjoyed watching the wind surfers that were out in full force.
There was a cool "playground" exercise area for adults so Hannah and Anita had their morning workout.
And so our time came to a close. Anita and Hannah dropped me off at the Airport and my long journey home began. The flights were made bearable with medication and I spent my 27 hour layover in London with Lorna and her family. That was absolutely amazing as we hand't seen each other in 17 years. We had so much to talk about and pray about and I had some time with her kids and husband as well. We went to a cool little ancient British Pub for lunch and then it was time to rush off to the airport.
Truly a whirlwind visit (once again I was unable to sleep through the night - only getting about 1-2 hours - I think I was on overdrive and not able to settle) and before I knew it I was boarding the long flight to Vancouver.
And now I'm HOME! Which is really, really awesome.
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