On our first day in Israel, we rented a car at the airport and drove to the Ein Gedi Kibbutz on the Dead Sea.
The flight to Israel was not as bad as we expected. We flew El Al on an overnight flight (coach, no less!). There was someone sleeping in between us. Luckily it was a small female that was probably on a "birth right" trip. The GPS device in the car wasn't going to take us the way we wanted to go - which drove a little bit through the West Bank. But everyone in Israel goes that way. The GPS route would have added an hour and a half to the trip.
As is typical with traveling east, the room wasn't ready when we arrived. We wandered through the garden like zombies until the room was ready.
The plus side on a trip to the desert is that in the first few days of jet lag, you'll be wide awake for the early hours of the day when it's cool. So our first day, we went to Ein Gedi - which is a natural spring. There's a kibbutz near there where we stayed. And there's a spa on the Dead Sea that is run by the kibbutz.
We arrived at Ein Gedi as soon as it opened. David politely said "You are wearing your hat and drinking 2 liters of water on this trip because I'm not carrying you back to the car when you faint from heat exhaustion." Thank you for caring, David.
Along the walk were little prairie-dog like animals called Hyrax (Hyraxes? Hyraxi?") They loved to sun themselves and climb the trees to eat the leaves. I don't know how they got so pudgy on a vegetarian diet. There were also Ibex (Ibexes? Ibexi?) - which were deer-like animals grazing for grass. Neither of the animals seemed bothered in the least by people.
Along the walk were occasional pools caused by the waterfalls. We stopped at one that was empty for a swim break. The water was pretty warm for a natural spring. It was only 9am by the time we got to the first pool and it was already extremely warm, so the water felt great.
At the top of the walk is the main attraction: a very big waterfall (I think called David's Waterfall). We got there just before the tourists descended upon us.
There was more that we could have hiked up to see, but we weren't feeling that adventurous so we headed back to the car. A two minutes drive from Ein Gedi is a site of an ancient synagogue called, appropriately, The Old Synagogue. There's a tent covering the ruins where you can see some very well preserved mosaics.
After Ein Gedi, we went back to the room and napped.
