Masada

I got up at 4:45 A.M. to visit Masada. A lot of people hike up for sunrise, but unfortunately for me, I had a 45 minute drive from the ranch I was staying at and the sun started coming up about 30 minutes into my drive.

It still made for some dramatic vistas as I drove up the southern end of the Dead Sea.

I'd decided to start my hike up Masada early because I knew the heat by 8 A.M. would make it impossible to do the hike. The plan was to hike the Snake Path on the eastern side of the mountain up and take the cable car down a couple of hours later after I explored the site. The Roman Ramp Path on the Western side is considerably easier, but I thought the Snake Path would be the cooler experience. Also, the Roman Ramp is reached by an inland route, which would have meant I wouldn't get to drive along the Dead Sea on my way to and from Masada.

Well, the Snake Path was quite the experience. The path is steep and rocky, with many steps thrown in. I'd been doing a lot of walking while in Israel (I'd walked almost 6kms in Tel Aviv two days earlier) so I figured I was at least in good enough shape to manage it.

The views were spatactular, but by the halfway point up the mountain I was spent and not focusing on my surroundings much, other than to keep slowly plodding toward the top. I was soaked with sweat. I found out later that the temperature was close to 90 at 7 A.M. Officials at the park had closed the path for hiking up by 8 A.M. when the temperature broke 100.

The sign at the beginning of that path states that the hike should take about 45 minutes for most people. It took me about 70 minutes. By the end I was walking about 500 feet at a time before resting and drinking water. I drank almost all of my 4 liters of water by the time I'd made it to the Snake Path Gate at the top. I found a bench just inside the gate and sat for a while catching my breath and cooling down before venturing out and exploring the site.

Madasa is one of the most famous sites in Israel. The story is controversial not just for it's content, but also because much of the archeological evidence does not back up the account given by 1st century historian Josephus, who recorded his version from oral accounts from the only five survivors. In 73 A.D., seven years after the fall of Jerusalem to the Romans, a radical group of Jews were still living at Masada, the cliff top fortress built by Herod the Great over a hundred years earlier. The Roman legions had been sent out of Jerusalem to quash the last of the Jewish resistance, and Masada was one of the last holdouts.

The Roman Ramp

After months of failed attempts by the Romans to take the site via the Snake Path, the Romans began to build a massive ramp on the west side out of stones and massive amounts of earth using Jewish slave labor. As it became clear to the leaders of Masada that defeat was imminent, the leaders had decided that they would rather die than be taken alive by the Romans and forced into slavery.

A plan was devised where 10 men were selected to kill the residents of the city first, then each other so that only one man would have to commit suicide, a grave sin in Judaism. When the Romans finally breached the gates, they entered a completely empty city with piles of bodies laying in the center. The zealots had even left their food stores out in the open to show the Romans that they had chosen death, and had not been in danger of starving. The survivors who told the story to Josephus were two women and five children who had survived by hiding in a cistern.

Each year at their swearing in ceremonies, soldiers of the Israeli Defense Force are brought to Masada and repeat the oath that "Masada shall never fall again".

The site itself was very interesting. The views over the southern end of the Dead Sea were extraordinary.

It took me about three hours to explore the site. I first explored the southern end of the mountain, where the ruins were not extensively restored of excavated.

Of particular interest on the south side of the ruins was the cistern. These massive rooms designed to hold the city's water were carved right into the rock below the main level of the city. In such an arid region, keeping a good amount of water stored nearby was vital to the survival of the city.

The views from the Southern Wall also gave me a perspective as to how tough it must have been to take this cliff-top fortress.

The picture above is the ruins of one of the seven camps the Romans built around the base of Masada. The was also one built on the top of the cliffs to the southern end of the fortress.

The North side of Masada contained a number of very interesting ruins, including the platforms and temples that Herod build on the northern slopes.

There were extensive ruins of warehouses and animal pens. Looking at the size of these it was easy to see how much though had been put into the importance of fortifying Masada in case of a siege.

As with many ruins I'd seen in Israel, there were elaborately decorated bathouses, and the one at Masada was no exception. There were still some of the mosiacs remaining, as well as the some of the painted walls in some of the rooms.

The above picture was taken using my fancy new zoom lens that I purchased when I bought the camera right before the trip. The green patch in the middle Ein Gedi, the National Park I'd visited the previous day.

Look closely and you can see the cable car ascending

I enjoyed my exploration of Masada, and even after three hours on top of the mountain, I felt like I could have explored for another hour or two. The heat of the day was finally starting to get to me. It was 105 degrees at 1030 A.M. and the sun wasn't even directly overhead yet. There was no way I was walkig back down the snake path, instead I opted for the eight minute cable car ride back to the visitor center.

Sore and more than a little sunburned, I headed back to Ein Bokek (see The Dead Sea post) to get some air-conditioning and some free Wifi, before heading to Tel Arad, which I will cover in my next post.

Arad & Sunset

Exhausted from my early morning climb of Masada, I had little energy left in the afternoon but decided to make a quick stop by the ruins of Tel Arad, some 30 kilometers east of The Dead Sea and 10 kilometers east of the modern city of Arad.
Modern Arad is interesting in that it is one of the few cities settled in the Negev that can be considered a success. Many of the other cities in the desert failed to achieve any level of prosperity, but Arad continues to attract people. It's not that Arad has many interesting sites, but the elevation and air quality make it a desirable retirement destination for many elderly Israelis. The desert around Arad is has also been moderately in successful in being set up for farming.
Tel Arad is like many other archeolgical sites in Israel- it's the ruins of a city (or area) that was occupied by many different cultures, including the Canaanites, Israelites, Persians, Macabeans, Romans, and Muslims. The first Canaanite settlements date from 4,000 years before the time of Christ.
The highlight of the ruins is the reconstructed Israeli fortress located on the hill overlooking the ruins of the Canaanite city.
The fortress has been partially reconstructed from materials excavated from the site. The original fortress was built during the reigns of David and Solomon. The gates to the city are very similar to the ones found at Tel Megiddo, which was also built during the same time period.

Sacrificial Altar

The Holy of Holies

Inside the fortress are the ruins of a Judean Temple, the only one to have ever been excavated. I was specifically impressed with the reconstructed sacrificial altar, and the Holy of Holies, which offers a rare look into the religious life of the Israelites.
Below the Israeli fortress and encompassed by the ancient Canaanite walls is the ruins of that Canaanite city of Arad. As it was over 100 degrees and I was exhausted (and suffering from a little ruin fatige) I admired the ruins from the hill, and then headed back to Dimona and the camel ranch I was staying at.

The sunset photos above were taken from a hill overlooking the place I was staying, The Negev Camel Ranch, which was right next to Mamshit National Park and about 8km from Dimona. I'll be covering all the places I stayed in a post near the end of the trip.

The Desert Cities of the Negev

The Desert Cities of the Negev is a UNESCO World Heritage Site the is comprised of four Nabatean cities of Shivta, Advat, Mamshit, and Haluza. I was able to visit the first three of these, which are all Israeli National Parks. These cities were built in the 1st century B.C. They were important posts on the Incense Route, which stretched 2,400 miles from the modern day countries of Oman and Yemen at the tip of the Arabian Peninsula on the Arabian Sea, through Saudi Arabia and Jordan, finally ending in the port of Gaza on the Mediterranean Sea.

The first of these cities I visited was Mamshit, which was also known as Memphis.
Mamshit is the best smallest of the cities, but is also the best preserved. Mamshit's era of prosperity was also shorter than that of the three cities I visited. The city ceased to be a popular trading post during the Roman occupation in the 1st century A.D., so they residents of the city became expert breeders, raising famed Arabian Stallions.
Many of the corrals used for these animals are visible today.
Mamshit is also famous for the ruins of it's two churches. Especially interesting are the mosaics located in the ruins of the 4th century church located in the Northeastern quarter of the complex.
The site today has a number of reconstructed buildings as well. The picture above shows a building that has been reconstructed so the visitor can see what the buildings would look like with a roof.
A number of stone archways have been reconstructed too. These served as entrances to buildings in some cases, decorate purposed in other, and as stabilizing force in others still.
There were a few other features about Mamshit that I really enjoyed. The first was the reconstructed dam on the dry river bed of the Mamshit River. When visitors travel to sights in the desert like this, many have trouble understanding how the people who lived in theses cities got water. The dam being where it is shows how the residents were able to use the topography of the area to their benefit. The dam also emphasizes that the area then was not as dry as it is today.
The second of the features unique to Mamshit was the reconstructed marketplace. I could almost envision what this might have looked like in the 1st and 2nd centuries A.D.
Mamshit was located about 6km outside of Dimona. If Dimona sounds familiar but you can't place it- you are not alone. The city itself is not famous, but the site about 10 km west of the city is. It's the sight of Israel's alleged nuclear weapons program. Driving in to Dimona I passed a large facility to with sign that said "MILITARY AREA: NO PHOTOGRAPHS OR VIDEO ALLOWED". These signed appeared every couple hundred feet along the fence separating this road from the facility itself. I obliged and didn't take any pictures of it (honestly, I was petrified of what would happen if I did), so you'll have to settle for this picture (above) of the city of Dimona taken from Mamshit.

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I visited Shivta the next morning. Shivta, located a mere 12 km from the Egyptian border, has the most remote feeling of the three cities I visited. Where as Avdat is located dramatically of a high hilltop and Mamshit is located on the valley of the Mamshit River, Shivta's location is more on an arid plain.



Shitva is also the most disputed of the sites. For many years it was considered one of the Nabatean cities, although now many archeologists believe the majority of the buildings were built during the Byzantine period. The main courtyard area (pictured above) and it's Byzantine style baths and watering systems have lead to this speculation.
Shivta, like Mamshit, had impressive ruins of two churches. The first, the larger Byzantine Church, is thought top have been built in the late 3rd century A.D.
The second (Northern) church is though to have been built later, somewhere around the 6th or 7th Century A.D. for the purpose of being a center of worship for pilgrims making their way from Jerusalem down to St. Catherine's on the Sinai Peninsula.
The second church contains a number of carvings that are consistent with this era of Byzantine architecture.

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The most important of the cities is Avdat. Avdat was the most important city on the Petra-Gaza portion of the Spice Route. Unlike Mamshit, Avdat continued to prosper even after the Roman conquest of the mid first century A.D. When international trading became impossible, the residents Avdat switched to agriculture as their major source of income.
Wine-making was key to the economy of Avdat. Ruins of the elaborate wine press are located just outside of the main gates.
The main gates of the city are also impressive. This were first constructed in the 1st Century A.D. and improved upon during the Byzantine period.
Like both Mamshit and Shivta, Avdat contains the impressive ruins of a Byzantine era church.
Avdat was finally abandoned in the late Seventh century A.D. after and earthquake leveled much of the upper city.
The most striking feature of Avdat is it's location, perched dramatically on a enlevated plain overlooking expanses of the Negev.

Each of these sites were similar in many ways, but they were different enough to make them interesting despite the number of ruins I had already seen. I enjoyed Mashit the best, but that could have been partially because the day I visited there was a much more pleasant tempurature than the day I visted Shivta and Avdat. More on my blazing hot day in the Negev in my next post.