A Day on the Sea of Galilee

We started our day in Capernaum (pronounced CAP-er-nom… I’ve been saying it wrong all these years!)  Here we saw the remains of an old synagogue & what is assumed to have been Simon Peter’s home.  Pretty cool.

 

St Francis of Asissi 

and Peter 

 

We loved the flora here – lots of flowers & trees that are very different from North Carolina.  We took some time under a tree to pray while looking over the Sea of Galilee, which I think was my favorite part.  It was REALLY HOT and we found shade whenever possible.

It’s amazing as we walked around thinking that this was the center of Jesus’ ministry for almost 2 years! There are more of Jesus’ miracles recorded in Capernaum than anywhere else in the Bible yet the people of Capernaum were unbelieving… look it up – Jesus was talking to these people when he said had the miracles been performed in Sodom, they’d have believed… BUT this is where He chose to be after being rejected in Nazereth – this is where Simon Peter, James, John and Matthew were called to follow – and follow they did.

We moved on to Tabgha, saw the church that claims the site of the multiplication of the loaves & fishes, though they now believe it happened on the eastern side of the Sea – but they had amazing iron doors & mosaic floors there.

We had fresh squeezed pomegranate juice which was a nice treat…  did I mention the HEAT?

We had lunch at a monastery/resort which is not open to the public, but Chris being Chris talked us in (on the recommendation of a friend.)  There was a crazy amazing cheese on this salad, which professed to be feta but was unlike anything I’ve ever tasted & I have to confess, at the end of the meal I had 22 olive pits on my plate.

There was a trail down to the water, which was beautiful, but our favorite thing to see there was the rock hyrax.  I wonder if they’d notice if I snuck this cutie on the plane?

jumping rocks at the Sea of Galilee…

On to the Mt of the Beatitudes, where a beautiful Catholic church stands.  Our timing was such that we came in on a visiting group singing acapella the beatitudes – i recorded a little of the end, and oh, man… it was really amazing.

The grounds around the church are pristine and my primary thought was that Jesus sure did pick a beautiful place to hang out and do ministry.  🙂

Oh… and the passion fruit slushie – yummy-freezie.  (Man, oh, man was it ever hot.)

Tiberias was sort of disappointing as it is a very large city with not a lot of significance for us.  We did, however, find a great information center and set up a boat ride on the Sea for tomorrow morning.  Chris got a Sim card for his phone which gives him a local Israel phone number, which makes communication here so much easier… AND we swam in the Sea of Galilee on one of the southern public beaches & finally cooled off at the end of the day.  I have to say I am surprised at how much trash there was just… everywhere.  and cats…everywhere.

We didn’t get to dip in the hot springs, but decided it was too warm for that anyway.  The highlight of the evening was schwarma & falafel – street food in Tiberias.  Yummo.

Back to the apartment for one last night in Tzfat & then a ‘Jesus’ Boat ride tomorrow before a drive to the West coast on the Mediterranean Sea.