Day 16

Today was probably the earliest wake up of the trip so far, 645am... Can you believe it. I know right. However the lack of sleep was well worth the day we had.

After Magal picked us up in Tel Aviv we hit the road headed north towards the Kineret. After a long drive filled with popcorn, bizili, bamba and more popcorn we eventually made it to Tiberius (next to the Kineret) and headed up the Arbel Mountains.

As Magal always knows the place to go we adventured on a walk that pushed (some of) us to our limits. This walk included ladders, ropes, steep hills, cows and many caves. Once we conquered the climb and proved ourselves champions we we're rewarded with an awesome view overlooking the Kineret.

From there after much deliberation we headed further north and drove up Mount Bental. There we explored the military barracks and looked over at Syria and Lebanon. The barracks were awesome as you could see what conditions the soldiers lived in and where they fought, as well as being able to play around underground.

We then grabbed a quick lunch of falafel and headed towards Mount Hebron (tallest mountain in Israel). After winding our way through many villages we finally made it to the top and saw where the ski resorts were in winter. But stopping at the bottom of the slopes was not good enough, we jumped onto the chairlifts and headed right to the top.

On our way up the temperature dropped by at least 20 degrees and with our singlets and shorts we were definatley not dressed for the conditions. Thus after a quick look around and a couple of photos we headed straight back onto the chairlifts and down to the bottom.

It was then we discovered that on the mountain there was something more fun. Something none of us have done for years. There was tobogganing.
Not wasting a minute we raced down to the track and jumped straight on. Now whilst it was on a guide rail and the possibilty of falling off was no longer there, it was still a lot of fun.

After another long drive, Magal dropped us in Haifa before he headed back to Tel Aviv. We checked into our hostel and shmoozed around for a bit before heading out for the night. It was at that point that we realized there is no nightlife in Haifa and had no idea what to do.

After walking up and down a couple of streets and grabbing a fancy Italian dinner that we attempted to extend for as long as possible, we headed back to hostel, in our room before 10pm.

We sent our goodbyes to Zac and Aidan, very excited that they were on the way and played a whole lot of shesh besh before hopping into bed. After chatting a bit to our Thai and Portugese roommates (who let us know the chicken in Portugal is as amazing as we dreamed) we were off to sleep, only to be woken up several times throughout the night by our other roommates.