Magical Mitzpe Ramon

After months of longing, we finally piled ourselves into a rental car and headed out for the weekend to go camping! We headed southeast an hour and a half from Be'er Sheba to a magnificent hole in the ground called Mitzpe Ramon. Camping in a foreign country brings up all sorts of issues one takes for granted when you are in a familiar place. For example, we didn't know where to buy firewood. Trees not being in abundance here in the middle of the desert, we headed to the local Bedouin market and almost got the car towed in the process. Needless to say, we left empty handed. The desert contiued on with its standard fare of sand, a bit of green as its spring here these days, and rolling hills. And then, all of a sudden, you come around a corner, and here it is: Mitzpe Ramon Canyon.















Contiuing out of town, undettered and commited to reach a campsite by sundown. Arriving in the park, we passed the government issue campground advertising an authentic "Bedouin Experience" with covered campsites, full plumbing, hot showers, and a vending station. We wanted to rough it, so on we drove. We continued a ways, pulled over, and set up camp. Here we are enjoying ourselves, in the process of gathering firewood from the dead shrubs in the area.















Much to our surprise, around sunset a camp ranger showed up to tell us about all of the rules we were breaking: dog not on a leash, disturbing the shrubs, fire without a permit, and on it goes. He was nice enough not to give us a ticket which at that point would have totalled several hundred dollars. Sadly, we packed up our wilderness camp and headed back to the government issue camp site. Foiled again! So we passed a night under a blanket of stars so full its hard to imagine there is room for them all. Awoke early to make some tea, and head out into the wilderness.

We hiked, camped, and enjoyed a hot summer day in March. Lovely. On the way home we happened by a secret lake and enjoyed a brilliant spring sunshine, while Jed took his first full dip and swim in the water. He was running around with such joy, everyone in the park was at full attention watching Jed enjoy his time at the lake. We caught an inspirational spring sunset, seen here, with trees and flowers blooming all around.















I am also including here a photo or two from a sculpture garden just outside of Be'er Sheba where we took Jed to wander around yesterday. The land around town is green and serene. Soon, it will be a big dust bowl again, but for now, its lovely.





























Its amazing how much ground one can cover with a car. Donations are currently being accpeted for Sera and Adam's "Buy a Car" fund...send your checks today! For those of you planning a visit while we are here, this is a great time of year. We will keep the tea pot on for you, hope to see you soon...

A day at the beach

Israel has beautiful, publically accessible beaches that run the entire length of the country. Buses are the primary mode of transport for us these days, and a train every once in a while, but we were lucky enough to rent a car compliments of Ma and Pa Rosenbloom a few weeks back and headed to the beach!








The city you see off in the distance there is Ashkelon. This beach was about thirty minutes from Be'er Sheba, and we were so so so sosososososososoos happy to see it!










This was Jed's first glimpse of the biggest puddle he's ever seen, and he loved it. He loves the water, and as you can see here, his mama loves him.










Hello? Hello, is there anybody in there? He's a digger.













The boys, lounging on the beach. Those shapely legs behind Adam belong to our roomie, Colin.













Havilah sleeping, Jed keeping an eye on everything. Too cute, eh?

Our house, in the middle of our street

Adam worked hard to find a house that Sera would feel "at-home" with and succeeded on all counts. The house is an 8 minute walk from Adam's school, a ten minute walk to the train station, and conveniently located close to the gym, a produce stand, and the dog park. All by chance, but isn't that just Adam's luck? Here are some photos of our lovely home:





Here is the front of our house, the gate, and two clementine trees. We live in the tallest house on the block, and the only one with a blue gate. Third house on the left after the garbage heap. If you saw it, you'd know exactly what we mean.









Here is the kitchen. Funny enough, we did not paint the hippie flowers on the cabinets. Clearly, this house was meant for us.










This picture shows the upstairs loft, the front door underneath, and the hallway going back to the bedrooms, yoga room, and bathrooms. The man you see there is Stephen, Adam's dad, and that lady squating there is me, Sera.












The back porch, we spend lots of time out here with temperatures averaging well above 80 degrees nine months out of the year. We eat most of our meals out here, and with the wonders of wireless internet we can even do crossword puzzles and post blogs outside.

Daily rituals

We thought you might like to see some pictures of some of the what, who, and the where filling our days here. Hopefully this will help you get a sense of what our daily lives look like here, until you come to see it yourselves, of course!

This is the dog park where Jed plays, splashes in toxic puddles, and chases little Ethiopian kids. This dog park is only about five minutes from our house, so Jed is a regular there. Lots of folks have dogs here in Be'er Sheba, and there are also plenty of strays to be found roaming about. We spend a good amount of time here, at least twice a day, feeling super lucky it is so close and has grass instead of dust for him to roll around in.







This produce stand is about two minutes from our house. Most of the produce is grown here in Israel due to impressive systems of tapping underground aquifers and the draining of the Red Sea. Luckily, produce is incredibly cheap here and we are eating lots and lots of it. We are here once a day, usually, and are now such reliable customers we get to shop on credit.







Our local coffee house, owned and operated by a couple consisting of a white Israeli, a black Israeli, and a newly arrived gorgoues baby. Thus the name "Black and White". Its like coffee shops in the US in the sense that we get mochas and lattes, its full of students hard at work until late into the night, and they play pop music. Its unlike the coffee shops in the US in that they let Jed come in and roam around, and these fancy beverages cost us about a buck a pop, cheap cheap, as they say.








A typical night at our house, dining on our table and cushions we shipped from 'nam. We like to have people over for dinner, and do so a few times a week. In this photo are Adam, Colin (our rommate from Whitefish, Montana), Havilah (from a family of 8 home-schooled kids hailing from backwoods Oregon), and Heather (from Cochrane, Alberta). We were dining on homecooked grilled salmon, miso rice, local Israeli red wine, and one of Colin's famous salads.





Adam hard at work, studying on our back patio being kept company by his faithful sidekick, our young Jedi. Contrary to popular belief, he does study quite regularly. Here he is pondering the complexities of something that most of us don't care at all about as long as it stays far away from us. Thanks Adam, for learning about this so that the rest of us don't have to.