Once we got back to the hotel and had breakfast, I headed back to the Budget rental car office across the street to extend the lease while Vinci did some final packing up. They were all too happy for us to keep the now exhausted Mitsubishi ASX as long as I liked, probably as they simply didn't have the space for it. After picking up Vinci and our luggage, we left Jerusalem heading south on route 60. This road cuts through the West Bank and passes by Bethlehem and Hebron, but it is classified as Area A, i.e. fully controlled by Israel, making passage possible for Israeli's and foriegners alike. I'm unsure if Vinci was trying to get me shot, but once we arrived at the checkpoint heading back into Israel, she claimed she never had the passports, although I had left her with them while I sorted out the rental car. I spent a rather tense five minutes tearing apart our luggage in the boot (trunk, for all you Americans) while a sniper trained his sights on my head. Vinci eventually found them tucked away in a secret compartment inside her cat themed hoody and the now very grumpy border control guard suggested we 'leave now', which we did.
Tel Arad
Tel Arad National park is a rather large 125 acre site. It comprises of a fortress on top of the hill (or 'Tel' - hence the name) and the ancient Canaanite city of Arad. This is not to be confused with the modern city of Arad, some 10 kilometers to the east of here. For all intents and purposes, I will refer to the ancient city as Arad for the rest of this post. It can be found on Google Maps at (31°16'45.79"N 35°07'32.91"E). Entrance is by admission and as standard practice, we were able to use our faulty parks passes to get in.
We decided to first storm the fort, something the Israelites were unable to do with an entire army. The Mitsubishi did an admirable job drifting up the dirt road to the gate, with far fewer horses than the Israelite army had. We breached the city walls within 90 seconds.
The fortress was built in the 10th century BC during the Iron Age and measured 50 x 55 meters. It was heavily developed over its 700 year life during three significant time periods. The earliest remains comprise of the northern outer walls and a couple of small towers on the western side. The bulk of the remaining walls, the main gate and the majortity of the internal structures all date back from the 8th - 6th centuries BC, apart from the large tower built in the center of the fortress which was built during the Greek period between the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC. Another Roman tower was built on top of this one, but was decommisioned in the 2nd century AD after the adjacent Nabataean kingdom was annexed inot part of the Roman empire. A diagram of the general outlay of the fortress is shown above, with the omission of the large central Helenistic tower in the center.
The internal structure of the fortress comprised of store rooms, housing and a temple. The storerooms (above), took up the north east corner of the fort and held enough food, supplies and weapons to last for months should the city come under siege. A large water system was constructed near the center of the fort and as of 2013, the public can walk down inside the large reservoir. Water was collected from rainfall on the building roofs which drained into the large plastered cistern. For overflow, a channel was built connecting to the city of Arad's even larger water system.
The most significant discovery has been the Judahite temple, the only one ever found in Israel. This included a courtyard, sanctuary and a Holy of Holies. In here was a smooth standing stone called a Massebah and a pair of incense altars on either side of the entrance. These extremely important artifacts were sent to the Israel museum in Jerusalem and what stands here now is a replica. The temple was buried during the reign of King Hezekiah in an effort to abolish public worship outside of Jerusalem. Amongst some of the historical artifacts unearthed were the inscriptions bearing the names of two priestly families which are mentioned in the Bible - Meremoth (Ezra 8:33) and Pashhur (Jeremiah 20:1).
Tel Arad is built on a 40 meter rise in the land, providing a commanding view of the surrounds. In the photo above, the remains of other buildings can be seen in the foreground with some of the ancient city of Arad visible in the far left top corner.
I've said it before, but the most incredible sight here to me was the amount of new life growing in the desert. The entire site is nearly covered in new grass and there were literally millions of caterpillars all over the grounds, making it almost impossible to avoid stepping on some of them. This influx of caterpillars has in turn brought a large variety of birds all taking advantage of the easy meals. A great number of colorful butterflies and insects were also seen.
Arad City
Arad was a Canaanite city which dates a lot further back than the actual fortress itself, beginning around 3000BC. It was occupied for around 350 years, during which time the Israelites unsuccesfully attacked the Canaanites. After its destruction, the city was deserted for the next 1,500 years until the Israelites came back, saw nobody was around and moved in. The city lasted until the middle of the 6th century AD.
Arad received its walls at the time of king David and king Solomon in the 10th century BC and over time was redesigned, engineered and rebuilt a handful of times, but was ultimately destroyed by the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar II. Despite this, a smaller city remained to an extent and was reasonably prosperous, especially under the rule of the Persians, Maccabeans, Romans and up to the early muslim era.
The excavations were performed mainly during the 1960's and 1970's, and occasional digs and restorations still occur. The city is reasonably well preserved and there are a number of interesting buildings including a number of temples and a large site believed to be the palace in the north of the city.
There have been numerous residences discovered, mostly against the city walls. The style of housing is unique here and most of the houses appear to be of more or less the same design, even given it's own style name "Aradian house". They had high stone walls, a courtyard and a broad main building. The entrance had the door way in one of the longer walls and one would step down inside with seats stone step like seats around the perimeter of the walls, similar to a synagogue. One such house has been partially restored in the city.
The water system and well are located in the center of the city in the lowest point of the land. This allowed water from the higher areas of the city, and later the fortress itself, to drain inside the large water system underneath. The well is very deep, but has been partially filled in.
Today was very overcast and heavier clouds arrived at around 3PM. The sky turned dark quicker than usual and scores of eagles started to circle around. We decided to move on to Be'er Sheva for an early dinner before returning back to Midreshet for the evening.
Speaking of birds, Arad is very close to the huge Nevatim Air Force base and a huge number of aircraft were seen. All day, Italian built M-346 Lavi supersonic trainers were practicing aggressor training overhead. We also saw a low flying Air Force Super King Air, but by far the highlight was the Boeing 707 air refueller landing in the distance. Nevatim currently holds the only squadron of the new F-35I Lightning II stealth fighters (known locally as the 'Adir') as well as the C-130J Super Hercules, although neither of these types were seen.
"When the Canaanite, the king of Arad, who lived in the Negev, heard that Israel was coming by the way of Atharim, he fought against Israel, and took some of them captive."
- Numbers 21:1
Arad to Midreshet via Be'er Sheva
For some reason, our Waze sat-nav system turned rogue and told Vinci to tell me to tell the Mitsubishi to turn off the freeway on the way back to Be'er Sheva into a shady Bedouin neighborhood. I thought this was a little odd as the nice freeway had signs every so often telling me that Be'er Sheva was on this road, but I decided to trust Vinci's instructions instead. This ended up taking us about an half an hour out of our way until we reached a dead end overlooking a valley. Sure enough, Waze decided we may prefer the scenic route through a series of back streets before sending us off the edge off a cliff. It seems Waze had set itself to the shortest geographical distance, rather than the fastest practical one. I therefore signed into Google Maps, which like myself, was confused why we were where we were, but got us back onto the freeway. Our dinner was... interesting. Vinci had a piece of goose welded to a piece of duck and when I saw Dudu salad on the menu, I thought I was back in China.
After taking an early supper in Be'er Sheva, we headed south once more to Midreshet Ben Gurion. Despite all the tourists cancelling accommodation, our previous host here was unable to accommodate us in the same flat, but was able to arrange another apartment for us instead. Just outside Be'er Sheva, as the sun was setting, the road met the railway line and on the off chance I may be able to see a train, pulled off the freeway. Sure enough, a container train departed from a large chemical plant at Ramat Hovav led by a fantastic Alstom Prima JT 42CW diesel, one of only eight ever built.
More photos from Arad can be found below
The remains of a wall from the Canaanite city of Arad leading uphill to the Fortress on Tel Arad
A large beetle chowing down on a small plant
A number of shepherds were seen around the National park making the most of the new vegetation
Remains of houses near the southern wall of Arad
A masked wagtail
Remains of the western side wall surrounding Arad
Continue to part 23 - click here