Adventures at the Dead Sea: the good, the bad and the smelly

Sometimes its difficult to go back to a place you really love after a long time. When we first arrived in Israel I found Jerusalem so different and modern that I wasn't sure I would enjoy being there. Then Rob started telling people what to do, or perhaps what not to do on the train, and I thought, oh yeah, I know this place. 

For better or worse, but mainly worse, The Dead Sea is greatly changed since I last visited 20+ years ago. To put our visit in perspective, let me first descrbibe my visit to the area in 1994. 

After only a few weeks in Israel I took the bus myself into the desert, while the rest of the my Hebrew University fellow students were on a noisy group trip. I started by hiking at the Ein Gedi Nature Reserve, which is across the highway from the Dead Sea. At the entrance gate I met a fellow hiker who wore only short-shorts and leather sandals. The only thing covering his chest was his waist-length thick curly hair and a tiny water bottle over his shoulder. He greeted me by saying, "We meet in the desert - it is a beautiful thing! Come, we go together." And so I followed this strange (and very beautiful) Israeli man through the hottest hiking conditions I'd ever experienced along a stream to a waterfall. 

After I said good-bye to the half-naked Israeli I crossed the road and entered the Dead Sea. I'm sure you all know how the high salt content makes you super buoyant. What you may not know is that if you swim in the summer it feels like bathing in hot salad dressing. It also stings terribly if you have any cuts, and I had tripped while jogging on French Hill the day before and couldn't put my hands in the water. 

By sunset that day I had a raging sunstroke-related headache. Luckily I met another traveler at my hostel, a German man, who gave me oral rehydration salts. When I asked about the pictures of babies on the package, he replied that the salts "were for Egyptian babies, but they would work on Canadian babes too." 

Fast forward 25 years and the Dead Sea is a bold example of human mismanagement of the environment. The Dead Sea has been shrinking five to eight meters per year for the past 100 years ever since the British started measuring the water levels a hundred years ago. The main reason is because the waters of the Jordan River that feeds it are diverted for agriculture. While I expected it to be smaller than it used to be, but I didn't know that the land surrounding the sea is mined with sink holes. Much of the shoreline is both dangerous and closed. There is no more beach at Ein Gedi, and there are only two areas for swimming, one where you have to pay, and another surrounded by large hotels. I don't think I've ever returned to somewhere I enjoyed and found it so destroyed. 

I think it was good thing that we had seen the sea on our way to Jerusalem, so we knew what to expect during our two days there because despite the degradations, the Dead Sea is still an amazing place. The hills on the Jordanian side are a misty pink and purple and the water glimmers unlike other bodies of water. 

For our current visit to the sea The Liebersmiths all agreed that we did not want to pay to bathe in the sea, nor were we keen on big hotel resorts. So we found a place to park along the highway, saw where some other people were navigating the pits, and headed about a kilometre through a garbage-strewn landscape down to the sea. The beach at this point was unlike anything we'd seen in Jerusalem. There were naked people coating themselves in mud, people playing guitars in makeshift tents, and nudies floating in the sea. (The nudity was startling because there are so many religious people in Jerusalem who dress very modestly. The nudies must have been from Tel Aviv ;).  The mud of the Dead Sea is supposed to be really good for your skin and and the nudies were coating ALL of themselves. Since we're obsessed with skin protection and all wear swim shirts we didn't have much skin to coat.

So what did the boys think of The Dead Sea? Makaio thought it was boring and smelly. Dassa liked it, but wanted to shower off the second he got out. And Rob? He was ecstatic. Apparently he doesn't float in regular water, and being buoyant was a first for him.  I was happy that since it was still spring the water wasn't hot. I was also happy that Rob enjoyed himself so much, but I'd say given the garbage and hot weather our family mud bath back in Vietnam was preferable. (And this is saying something!)

The following day we went to Masada, the biggest tourist attraction in Israel. Masada is an ancient fortification on top of a mesa-like rock plateau in the middle of the Judean Desert. It's famous because it was the last stronghold of the Jews during the Roman era when the second temple fell. A last group of rebel Jews hid up on this mountain, and when it became clear the Romans would breach their stronghold, they preferred to commit suicide rather than be taken slaves. Masada is an amazing archeological site, and a huge symbol of Jewish freedom in Israel. Every school child is taken there at some point and every Jewish tourist usually gets there too. Somehow I had never been during the 18 months I lived in Israel in the 90's, so I was excited to go. 

I didn't take this picture, but I've included to give an idea of this amazing structure.

Alas, Masada for the Liebersmiths was not a great cultural or archeological moment, but the site of The Great LieberSmith Family Meltdown. For three months prior to this we had enjoyed almost every moment of constant family togetherness. There had been moments of unbrotherly love, parental discordance, and pleasestopthatnow, but mostly we hiked, snuggled and enjoyed each other's company while piling into tiny tuktuks in Sri Lanka, or eating amazing food in Vietnam. However, Masada was hot, the kids were done with museums, archeological sites and anything educational, plus we were all getting over our virus. (Actually this was the day I was most sick.) A child decided to imagine fighting off the Romans by dropping small pebbles over the side of Masada. A brother thought this was very funny, resulting in a  parent who rarely gets upset (obviously not me) getting VERY angry. This parent decided he needed to be away from his children for a little while and explored on his own for awhile. The kids were unused to the parent being angry with them, and were miserable. Unfortunately the parent also accidentally took all our water with him, and left me to tour with two very unhappy and thirsty children. 


When we regrouped, we had a very quiet lunch in the underground parking lot - not the most scenic of spots.
 
 This is us pre Family Meltdown.

And here are some unhappy children

checking out the view post meltdown. The square bit in the distance is the remains of one of the Roman camps. 

 This is me pretending to feel great!

Lastly, here is the incredible view from Masada. You can see the cable car lines that lead to the top of the mountain. The cable car is itself an engineering marvel.

Our afternoon was much more successful. We bribed the kids into hiking at Ein Gedi with promises of waterfalls. Once they got going, the loved hiking through the streams and swimming in their clothes at the waterfall. Ein Gedi has been kept as beautiful as it was twenty years ago, and we passed numerous oryx on our way through the rocks. Makaio felt, unsurprisingly, as freaked out about the oryx as he was about donkeys, but the rest of us liked seeing them. 

The following are pictures of the hike. You start in this incredibly dry valley and it looks like there couldn't possibly be water. 

Then you find yourself walking beside a stream that seems to have etched itself into the rocks. You can either walk on the path or through the water. 

 

Then you arrive at this beautiful waterfall where you get to really cool off. We are actually sitting on the bottom of the pool in this picture, but pretending we were floating like we did at the Dead Sea. Not pictured in this shot is some of the other people who were hiking: a young couple from Florida taking pin-up photos, and a large religious family bathing fully dressed, even wearing their leather dress shoes. Israel is a place for ALL kinds.  

 This is me post waterfall dip. You can see the beautiful plants that cling to the oasis, as well as my very flushed face. I'm happy to report that I did not get heat stroke this visit.