From desert to sea

Day 8

I woke up to this view of the Dead Sea:

I could get used to this. We boarded our bus at 8am and headed to En Gedi, which turned out to be one of my favorite spots. It was behind the town of En Gedi that David fled and hid when Saul was seeking to kill him. David and his 300 men went to the hills (think of the Badlands of South Dakota, only taller) and hid in it's numerous caves while Saul chased him with 3,000 men. You read these stories, but until you are in the landscape it just doesn't fully come together. Caves dot the walls all over the place. The terrain is rocky, sandy, and very difficult to climb. Flash floods occur without warning. While there is very little water, there was a small stream fed by springs and runoff from above the cliffs somewhere (I have no idea where) that flows down to En Gedi.

We took a short hike up it to three pretty waterfalls (that I may have stood under). The area is gorgeous and rugged, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Val and Elizabeth are also hikers, so the walk up was enjoyed by us immensely. It is just fun doing things with people who share your excitement.

It's in a cave in En Gedi that David and his men were hiding when Saul entered to relieve himself. David sneaked up to Saul and cut a piece of his tunic off (1 Samuel 24). There was a reenactment of that moment that was capture digitally:

From En Gedi, we journeyed to Masada, a fortress built on a giant mesa overlooking the Dead Sea. Harod constructed it sometime during his reign from 37 B.C.-4 A.D. as a winter palace and a refuge if needed. After he died, the Romans used it as a garrison until it was taken over by the Jewish rebels during the Great Revolt in 66 A.D. It was there that the Jews made their last stand in 73 A.D.

Masada ruins

The story of Masada is not a pretty one. The last of the Jewish refugees/rebels lived on the mesa for about three years before the Romans surrounded the fortress and began a 3-month siege. They couldn't go up via the regular route because it was a small footpath (and therefore easily defended by the Jews), so the Romans built a massive ramp up to the city walls. From there, a tower was built and a battering ram was used on the gates. They didn't get them open the first day, however. The Romans had to quit for the night and the rebels gathered to talk.

It was 8,000 Romans against 960 Jews, with only 40 of them being fighting men. The rest were mainly women and children, and some untrained men. The Romans were brutal to those who resisted them--their method was rape, torture, kill the adults and babies, and sell the kids into sex slavery. What do you do? The Romans were going to get in the next day. In the end, the Jews decided to kill each other in a quick and fairky painkess fashion, with the final person committing suicide. When the Romans got into Masada the next day, they found the storehouses on fire and their intended victims dead. It is Israel's version of the Alamo.

View from Masada. You can see how it is easy to defend.

We explored the ruins of Masada as Uri told us the story and showed us Harod's palace. Afterward, we headed back to our hotel to float in the Dead Sea. It was a weird transition from experiencing something so sobering to becoming a full blow tourist. But...the Dead Sea is soooo cool! The water feels almost like syrup, and it just pops you right up as if you were wearing a life jacket. I went out a little ways and was able to just float there vertically as if I was standing on the bottom. Once the beach closed, we went back into the hotel and enjoyed the jacuzzi before dinner. It was a good day.