Travis & I were invited to Shabbat friday evening dinner with the tenants upstairs from the trade a pad apartment here. Ruben his wife & son were very gracious in sharing dinner and lots of knowledge about Isreal especially antiquties.
Partly on thier advice on the light traffic day of Saturday (the sabbat) we drove to the far north of the country, Stopping first at Tel Dan, ruins of a some centuries old BCE temple and seat of power. The obvious reason for the site is the largest volume spring of fresh water in the middle East. This water creates a lush enviroment and a beautiful National park.
It’s really quite amazing how much water is coming out of these many springs in a very short distance. This is designated as the source of the Jordan river. So of course I had to dip my head into the spring water. Besides the possible divine advantages it was very cooling.
This was the border of Isreal at the time of the British mandate & creation of the state, and because of the valuble resource of the water was fought over with the Syrian adjacent state. The park has left some of the defensive trenches, just a few yards from some of the ancient ruins, in place
Next we drove just a few miles NE. & up the slopes toward Mt. Hebron. This is the Golan hieghts that Isreal has captured and holds today from Syria.
On these slopes along what was the road to Damascus in the Arab & Crusader era circa 1100 to 1275 various Arab rulers in stages built a massive stone fortress. Now called Nimrods fortress by the Isreal National park service, Arabs undoubtedly have a different name. The final and some of the finest stomework additions to the fortress were done by Bilbik, under Baybar, a Mameluke sultan.
Anyway a whole lot of stones carved out of the mountain and stacked up for defense.
Shawn's travel updates 
Wohooo!! Nice one on the blog – looks great
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