Golan Heights, Sea of Galilee

Northern Israel is a lot of farmland- very different from the south, which is all arid and desert.
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Part of the plain of Armageddon, where Good and Evil will do battle and reality TV shows will finally perish. But for now, its a lot of farmland. Kind of anti-climatic, but belief enhances the meaning of this place- like a lot of places in Israel.
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Part of a daycare center...and by "daycare center," I mean "prison." This was one of two that we drove by.
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The next 5 photos are overlooking the plain that is the Jordanian Valley. The mountains in the background are Jordan and at the foot of those mountains is the Jordan River.
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Pretty self-explanatory. Order of the languages from top to bottom: Hebrew, Arabic, Pig-Latin.
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A close-up of a Jordanian look-out post between the border of Jordan and Israel. Even though Jordan and Israel have a peace treaty, this is more for keeping terrorists, criminals (the "high class" people) from going between the two countries.
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Looking over into Jordan.
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This is a cool photo- on the right are the Jordnian mountains, then on the left is the beginning of the southern part of the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 war. The Golan Heights are a very large plateau that overlooks for miles into Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. Very strategically important for Israel's defense and also secures the source of their water supply, which is the Jordan River.
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A far-off view of the Golan Heights (see background)
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The next several photos are of climbing the southern end of the Golan, which is right along the fence between Israel and Jordan. It may look like a pretty flimsy fence, but there are plenty of signs warning those who would cross that they just might run into little nuisances called "land mines." Upon hearing that, I'm deterred from doing a little fence-jumping.
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On top of the Golan. Much of it is farmland and growing crops.
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They make wine up on the Golan- so we went to a winery. Never got into the stuff, but its still cool to check out the whole process.
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"If they want to drink Merlot, we're drinking Merlot..."
"No, if anyone orders Merlot, I'm leaving. I am NOT drinking any f*cking Merlot!!!"
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