Keep living. Keep learning.

At the end of our 1st week in Israel, we were lucky enough to be welcomed to attend a Passover Seder meal at the International Synagogue in the city. The evening began with a service in the Synagogue attended by many of the community, followed by the Seder meal which marks the beginning of the 7 days of Passover. The specific courses of the meal are eaten around a structured evening of storytelling. The Rabbi that led the evening was young and enthusiastic, encouraging the young children in the room to answer questions pop quiz style and a correct answer was rewarded with flying candy launched from a corner of the room. The Rabbi also encouraged attendees to take part in the evening by taking a turn reading sections of the story (the exodus from Egypt) to the rest of the room. The evening was accompanied by copious bottles of red wine, which resulted in much drink infused revelry of songs sung with vigour, but little tune and the stamping of feet and slamming of hands on tables in time to their own tune. Everyone enjoyed themselves. Not only did we meet some interesting people, but my takeaway from the evening is a fond memory of joyous celebration and a real sense of community. A great experience.

Passover this year happened to fall at the same time as Ramadan and Easter. All three religions had significant and important religious festivals that shared the same dates in the calendar. Unfortunately, in all societies there are people that will live there life in the extremes and in Israel this is no different; despite seeing with our own eyes that Judaism, Islam and Christianity sit comfortably side by side in this country, this clashing of cultures over the festive period saw intolerance and unacceptance in Jerusalem where Muslims and Jews clashed with the police over access to a religious site.

We spent the 2nd week exploring further afield. This country is so small that the train network is easy to get your head around and reaches most key places, and what isn't served by rail, is accessible by a reliable bus network. I was told that in Israel you're not allowed to flag down a taxi on the street. Instead, you order one through an app on your phone and it's very straight forward. So we hopped in a cab, then took a train to the city of Haifa about 1 hr north of Tel Aviv and spent a few days experiencing a very different vibe and unfortunately some very different weather!

We stayed in a a large old house that had once been owned by a Sultan, so it was very grand in its old world architecture and layout, but it had been lovingly updated by its current owner, an artist called Nurit. Nurit welcomed us warmly and showed us to our room which was spacious and conveniently located on the ground floor at the back of the house, beyond a huge shared living area and kitchen dining area. THe only slight concern was that the bed creaked so badly, we thought it was going to break. Having broken a bed in Senegal by simply sitting on it, I had a wave of anxiety come over me and couldn't relax. But Gaz convinced me it was just a noisy bed and was quite sturdy, so I cautiously crawled in later that night . Needless to say, the bed was fine and actually pretty comfy, despite it's noisiness.

We found a great cafe next door, with really friendly guys working there and a cheap but tasty menu, so this became a staunch favourite for a quick cuppa or late night snack while we stayed in Haifa. It was somewhat of a relief to find a food place that was low cost - Tel Aviv and Jaffa were stinging the wallet a little.

The first evening we wandered around the Bat Galim area, strolling down the beach front and exploring the network of streets near our accommodation. The sun was setting as we watched an older Jewish couple sit togather on the rocks at the edge of the beach, in a quiet moment of togetherness. He read to her as she looked out to sea. It touched the romantic in me and reassured me that even in a country so close to conflict, geographically and politically, the people still have to go about their daily lives and take comfort in their loved ones.

The following day we attempted to take the cable car up Mount Carmel that overlooks the city, but the cable car line was so long we decided to shelve that adventure. So we caught the bus into the city to explore the Holy Bahai Gardens. The beautiful gardens are set over 19 terraces that rise up one side of Mount Carmel, earning their other name 'The Hanging Gardens of Haifa'. The terraces are connected by staircases that total 1500 steps. In the centre of the gardens is a temple where the pilgrims of the Bahai faith can come on their pilgrimage to worship. The gardens themselves are a gift from the Bahaii faith to all of humanity.

We also took a train to the small and ancient city of Acre (pronounced Akko), which sat on the opposite side of the bay from Haifa. As we arrived and left the station I overheard 2 people being turned away from riding the train. I had a minor worry start to form - Israel has it's own way of working throughout the week - Sunday is the first normal day of the week. Friday and Saturday are the weekend. Shabbat is a 24 hour period of rest that seems to begin on Friday evening and ends on Saturday evening. During Shabbat, almost everything is closed, including public transport. Added to this, during religious festive periods it seems that shabbat rules can apply. The day we went to Acre was the last day of Passover and so Shabbat rules applied. We did not know this.

My worry was starting to niggle and we needed a Wifi connection so that I could freely search the web without frustration. We caught a local bus into the old town and located a restaurant. We ate good food while discovering that our plans for getting home by train or bus were busted wide open. No transport was now available until 4pm the next day. We silently screamed into our food and pondered the mess we had gotten ourselves into.

Salvation came in the form of the Gett Taxi app. Thankfully some taxis were still running and I was able to secure a taxi back to our accommodation in Haifa at the cost of about £30, expensive when compared to £2.50 for the train, but a way home and I was thankful for that. So we ordered a cab for later in the afternoon and headed into Haifa to explore the old city. Despite all the shops and places of interest starting to close, we had a good time walking the old streets in the sunshine and exploring the port and the old city walls. Acre is definitely one of my favourite places so far in Israel. Like Jaffa it is ancient and beautiful, but it is smaller and less populated than Jaffa. What had begun as a disaster of a day, ended with smiles on our faces, full bellies and a comfortable cab ride back to our digs.

Whilst in Haifa we also wanted to visit Nazareth which didn't seem too far away, and if possible the Sea of Gaililee but the weather changed bringing terrible storms and heavy rain which made even venturing out for food a bit of a challenge.

On the day we checked out, we decided to simply catch the train back to Tel Aviv. The weather was bad, but we walked to the station in the rain, only to find that it was shut and we soon realised that the Shabbat style 'end of Passover' closures were continuing. The earliest train home was 9.30pm. We couldn't stay standing outside this station for 10 hours! So we went back to the place we had been staying and for a couple of hours simply sheltered from the bad weather, until the 1st bus started running at 3pm. Then we took a series of buses over a 3.5hr journey back to Jaffa. Whilst the buses themselves were fine, the journey was not fun at all, largely because of the rain. When we had to change buses in the middle of the countryside, standing in an open bus shelter for 30 minutes in the cold and rain wears thin really quick.

But you suck it up. You try to smile and you get on with it. It was a fairly cheap journey home - about £9 each. A taxi would have been over £100 so wasn't an option. We figured it out though and there's something about having to unexpectedly make new plans and think on your feet that gives you a sense of satisfaction when you finally figure it all out and achieve what you wanted to. It's a big part of what travelling is about - learning to adapt and see change as what it is - not good or bad, it's just a change. And yeah it can mean spending more than you expected to, and busting your budget, but in the long run getting back on budget is just another thing you have to figure out.