8th day (The Arbel And Then Some)

I'm thinking that I have to re-invent the start to my blog entries. 6.3o at the segafreddo is just SO passe'.
Soon enough the days will be cooler, daylight saving will finish and I won't have to drag myself out of bed at 5.30. Still, the first weekend of September is still summer weather and there we were, enjoying our pre-walk machiattos.
Today the vibe was a bit different from most of our seggafreddo meetings.
Yoni was sitting there uncharacteristically relaxed and cheerful after 2 glorious weeks in Vietnam.
I rarely suffer from back pr oblems but today I walked in stooped from a two week struggle with a muscle in my back that refused to do what it's meant to do. I'm not sure what a physio would say about walking 15km with a sore back, but I have 3 that might have an opinion and I know read this blog...one who has walked a section with us, one who is planning to walk a section with us and one who would love to walk a section with us but whose contribution is a fine cartoon that is\will be the cover of the blog. (The walking actually freed up my back, thank you for asking)
Garry generally leads a relaxed life only occasionally having to straighten out some bent Chinese workers, which he does with casual aplomb. But today he was as tense as a wound spring after having spent the last 4 days dealing with local council bureaucrats, trying to get Lee to school and back. Frustrating the public seems to be part of the job description for council bureaucrats everywhere in the world but perhaps here in Israel they've mastered the art. There's nothing like a good walk to loosen tight muscles and forget bureaucratic tension.
After dropping my van off at the end point Garry took us along a short cut to the starting point. Big deal! I wouldn't be writing about it here except that Yoni was excited as this was the 1st time his new car had seen dust and equally the first time he had to switch the little 4*4 button (I'm not certain there really was a need but hey, the button is there to be used)
The official start to this leg was at the petrol station which was the official start to our previous leg (we walked the last leg north to south, this leg south to north). We have, however, a stated aversion to road walking. So, as with the previous leg where we skipped forward a couple of km of road, here too we started at the entrance to the Arbel national park and saved ourselves a few km of road. The Arbel is basically a 400 metre high cliff which from the top, where we started, has dramatic views of the Kinneret and Golan Heights. This being a national park a man in a green uniform came sprinting up to us in order to inform us that we had to pay to fall down the cliff face. So for our 20 shekels each we got one map but no receipt. hmm. Our mission was to descend the cliff face and then continue on along the flat mostly agricultural land adjacent to the Kinneret. Since we estimated that the flat strip was going to be hot and boring we had wanted to have horses meet us at the Beduin village at the bottom of the Arbel and we would ride to the end point. The only riding place in the area was distinctly unenthusiastic about the idea but was willing to go along with it for the price of a used Lear Jet. Since we weren't interested in buying brand new Arabian race horses or slightly used Lear Jets for the riding place, we declined and decided to use conventional foot power.
Now the purists amongst us, if there are any such beings, may be aghast at the thought of skipping parts of Shvil Yisrael, The Israel National Trail that go on roads. The same purist may look done his purist nose when I contemplate the possibility that we may ride horses, 4*4 tractor- buggies or any other form of non pedestrian transport in the future along the 940 km trail. When it comes down to it we're doing this trail for enjoyment. We don't have to prove anything to anybody and if we get to Eilat having walked 800 km and used some form of motorized or equine transport along the way then I for one will be very happy.
Likewise walking direction. In general we are walking North to South but if a leg calls for climbing or descending Mt Meron then we'll descend. If the route would have us climb a 400 metre cliff, then I'll switch directions and go down the cliff, thank you very much. So today we descended the cliff, hoping that our 20 shekels were used to re-enforce the concrete that held the hand rungs that we were gripping in place and didn't line the pocket of the man in green who didn't give us a receipt. They say that the views from the Arbel are stunning and I believe whoever the "they"is. However when you are concentrating on not putting your foot in the wrong place for fear it will be the last place you put it, the last thing that you're going to do is lift your head and try to make out landmarks through the late summer haze.
Whilst hanging on for dear life , trying to negotiate where to put our feet, hoping that it would be the right place, coz the wrong place could be really wrong, we came upon some rare mammals. Fellow shvillers. Two friendly chatty girls carrying backpacks that doubled their body weight who were about to climb the Arbel cliff. In the heat. My heart went out to them. A bit further along we crossed paths with 3 or 4 serious guys, walking with the aid of walking poles, who barely grunted a good morning on their way to the cliff. I wonder, how do walking poles (stokes? or is that just for skiing?) actually help, other than making you look really serious? Can someone help me out here.
We also saw cows for the first time since the green spring grasses turned brown. These cows, however, were not of the plump, contented variety but were emaciated and somewhat Biafran looking. They certainly wouldn't have made it to the plates of our Tuval Carnivore Club.
It doesn't take too long to descend 400 metres, even if you're not falling, and we got to the village of Hamam in one piece. This village of Hamam has been in the news lately for the wrong reasons. A particularly cruel psychopathic mass murderer who enjoys torturing and burning his victims comes from this village and was recently arrested. We were a bit worried that the bad gene was still evident in some other family member here. These Beduins have big families.
So we passed as quickly as possible past Hamam, for once hoping to get burnt by the sun and not by a family member of the fore-mentioned murderer. Resigned to walking rather than riding the remaining kilometres, we headed into the rows of fruit trees that the path would go through for the foreseeable future. The path ran between olive, date, mango, loquat, and various citrus fruit orchards, and it was very pleasant indeed. At one point we were surprised to see a lone Thai fruit-picker picking red grapefruits. We took a couple of pieces from the nearly full crate and ate them immediately. Juicy , tart grapefruit, fresh off the tree...just the thing for a warm (hot?) walk.
We have had our share of the unexpected on the 7 or 8 walks we've done so far. Some monumental, like Barry and the car keys, some minor like this Thai fruit picker or Biafran cows on the slopes of the Arbel. Bumping into Hagit and Rafael, 2 of Susan's doss ex madrichim from Beit Hagalgalim (House of wheels, Susan's previous place of employment), by a pond along the track was a pretty big, very pleasant surprise. They were celebrating their 2nd wedding anniversary (we were at their wedding) by doing a midnight, moonlit hike, camping out and dipping in this secluded spring (called ein nun, or the Nun spring, according to the book). Admirably romantic, leaving us perhaps just a little jealous that after 20 years of marriage and 10 kids between the 3 of us, we just don't do these things anymore.
Leaving them to their private romantic celebration we trudged on, the sun getting higher in the sky and us getting accordingly hotter. At a certain point the shvil sign was ambiguous and we took the high road when the low road was the way to go. It didn't cause too much of a detour but by this time Yoni was starting to fry from the heat, so he ran up ahead looking for some SPF from the banana trees. Meanwhile I waited for Garry , who had gone off in a different direction to see if he could find the orange, white and blue sign and had to rejoin us on the correct path. Here we applied a valuable lesson learnt from previous pre-shvil walks. Check for your signs before you get really really lost and save yourself lots of unwanted and unnecessary kilometres in the baking sun.
After a longish break we continued on to where the fruit trees gave way to a dry creek bed. This was the bottom of nahal amud. After a short walk up the creek bed we arrived back to my van, hot but very contented. In the end I was glad that it hadn't worked out with the horses. That's not to say that I don't want to do part of the shvil on horseback. The opposite is true. I look forward to doing a leg, or part of, on horseback. But this leg was just right. A challenging cliff descent followed by 10 kilometres or so of unspectacular but nevertheless enjoyable walking.
Actually Garry and I had a difference in approach to today's walk. Garry felt that we've been spoilt by the spectacular views that we've had in each and every one of the walks thus far. Spoilt to the point where he was unenthusiastic about walking the boring parts and thus wanted to divert this boredom by a horse ride. My feeling wasn't exactly the opposite but went along the lines that we've become a little spoilt picking short easy walks in the summer and whilst it makes no sense to try to tackle 18 or 20 hard kilometres, I was happy push my body a bit and do a medium length walk of medium difficulty. Yoni just wanted to avoid the hot baking sun as much as possible. Of course there is no right or wrong, just differences in approach. Whether we'd ridden or walked we passed our first 100 kilometres today, which is not a bad achievement. Before I get too self congratulatory I should remind myself that we have another 840 to go.
We are now faced with somewhat of a dilemma. The previous walk (Upper Tiberius to Yardenit baptismal site) had us skipping forward 2 legs; nachal amud and today's. There is agreement that we will reserve the long and beautiful nachal amud for the winter. The leg that continues after the end of our previous walk is very long (30km) and will require us doing an overnight. We may jump forward another leg and finish up in Nazareth. We may have a Swedish guest walking with us ...who knows.
Meanwhile we grappled with the humus at Abu Abu or some such place which filled our bellies just enough not to bother a good afternoon shloof and return to the world of dirty water, sore backs and frustrating bureaucrats