Day 26: Charlie

Since Beverly is a fan of this blog, her husband Charlie Reagan is today's theme. He's been a volunteer at Omrit for the last 7 or 8 years and has made himself indispensable. He drives trucks and vans, records all our pottery, glass and other finds in a computer database (a major job) and does a lot of heavy lifting too in the squares. Of course, his most important job is putting down the wheelbarrow some time after 8am and driving off to pick up our field breakfast. And delivering it in a timely manner. Thanks Charlie!

Day 25: Sculpture Garden

Have I mentioned that Kibbutz Kfar Szold has a sculpture garden? I think not, but it does. It's a combination of folk art and a museum of old (kib) agricultural machinery. I don't know who did it (I think maybe just kib residents) and there is a sign down on the highway directing one up. The student consensus is "weird" and "creepy", but, of course, I like it though it's not first rate folk art.

Speaking of the kib, it's clear that it's a dying rather than a dynamic entity. The factory buses workers in (Russian and Arab) and there are many abandoned buildings that the archaeologists use for storage. Lots of decaying features too, like tennis and basketball courts that are unusable, and the outdoor movie theatre never has movies and the pub is open one night a week, but the olympic-sized pool is open and the sculpture garden is watered and maintained. The kib'll last a while longer.

Day 24:In the hole

We gussied up our first square today - after some delays - and final pictures were taken. This always before the sun comes up over the Golan so that there are no shadows. So you know how earlier we had to arrive. Much.

Our second square proceeds apace and we've hit the archaeological jackpot: a hole. An empty hole. Right next to our first square with walls and random good stuff, we have: nothing. After all the rocks and stones that signified nothing were removed we had a hole. We're a meter down and hitting really fine silt so we may hit 2 meters and bedrock tomorrow. There is one column drum that we haven't found the bottom of yet - so there's a little hope. Square 3 coming up very shortly - time is running out.
The afternoon saw a road trip with Carli, Katie and Emily to Metulla. Metulla is in the northwest corner of our Valley projecting out into Lebanon, which surrounds it on 3 sides. It's a faux-Swiss resort town very prettily laid out. The Swiss Chalet was, however, named the Alaska Inn and I had a nice latte there. We also saw the above tank. (That's Lebanon in the background)

Tracy, Paul and I went off to dinner to a restaurant serving trout from the Jordan River. A fancy place with ducks and swans on the creeks running through the outdoor dining area and a peacock in the parking lot.

Day 23: Today it's all-Bill

This morning I got a ride into Q. Shmona to the El Dan car rental agency and picked up a little Hyundai. Wheels! Tracy was with me and off we went to the Med. We followed the Lebanon border around the north of Israel heading to the sea. Less than 2 hours later we are at Monkey Beach! The beach along this northern coast of Israel is quite undeveloped and we were lucky to find this public beach on the Mediterranean.

Tracy chatted up the South African bartender as we drank a beer and shared a large plate of fries. We were sitting at an outside bar and checking out the waves. Heaven.

When we returned Natalie, Nancy and Flora and I headed for the mountains north of us. We had a circle route planned out but we got sidetracked in a Syrian Arab town in the Golan. The road went in but we couldn't find where it came out. But we had a good mental map of that town before we backtracked and came back. My riders were quite calm, mostly, as I assured them that those Syrian flags all over the place didn't indicate animosity to us. We didn't stop to ask for directions though.

Day 22: Half-day Shabbat

I should have told you about Becca's photo blog earlier. If you can't get enough of Omrit and Israel, check it out.

On Friday everyone is tired, weary and exhausted. The Shabbat half-day, though, is full of enthusiasm and energy. "What? It's time to go? Let me finish here!" But breakfast at the kib at 9:30, BBQ tonight and almost 48 hours of rest is a fine thing. As things go slow this afternoon I'm thinking, "Boy, it sure would be nice to have a car!" Hey, wait, I'm getting one tomorrow. Already have 2 lists: places to visit and people who want to visit. The Galil Mountain Winery is high on the list.
Major pottery reading today, our ceramicist is up from Jerusalem, with young son. Always exciting, it's even more so when she looks at a small piece of pottery and says "Roman lamp" or "Hellenistic". And Daniel is always ready to help.

Day 21: Mixed-up Friday

A topsy-turvy day is my only excuse for not blogging promptly. The grass fire Thursday burnt all around our site but didn't penetrate it. We generally keep the weeds low, this is was probably the reason. It burnt some of our shade tent ropes though, it came that close. It has the benefit of letting us see the ground a lot better and one staff member is prowling around looking for the area to start the next 10 years of work. (We expect locusts or frogs to hit next week.)

There are areas near our site (starting half-way up the hill in the picture above, for example) that are fenced off as old mine fields. There was a Syrian military position near here that the Israeli Army captured (though not easily) during 1967 war and both sides had mine fields around the border. The fire set off a number of them.

We went out a later in the morning but only stayed a few hours - The air was a bit foul and ash was flying a little. Most of us came out later in the day though. A huge flock of storks was circling around in the late afternoon but I think they had to move on a little to find a good unburnt spot to settle.


I was fortunate enough to be invited out in the evening by the staff to go with them to the home of Israeli friends of the Omrit excavation. (My bike seller (!) and his wife (who works at Tel Hai)). It was a nice meal and good conversation. There were tables set up outside where we ate - which reminded me of some similar good times I had many years ago in Afghanistan.

Day 20: Well, maybe not.

We got a wildfire near the site. Bummer. We get to sleep in an extra hour so the situation can be evaluated in the morning. Crop duster planes are dropping red stuff and land mines are exploding. What a county!