I suppose it is a question everyone asks; how far should I aim to go on the INT each day?  There are so many factors – what is the elevation to be lost and gained? how are the weather conditions (is it wet? or windy? or hot?), how rough is the terrain? what is the time of year and how much daylight is there? how much weight have I got to carry? and how fit am I?

I learned from the first three days how easy it is to over-estimate how much ground you can cover in a day in the heat of summer, especially if nursing an injury (and my achilles, although improving, is not yet healed).  It is also now abundantly clear that for most of its length the INT is far from a footpath, and at times the going can be tough.  Of course, the Red Guide gives a good idea of what a young fit hiker should aim to do each day, but that is about whole days and does not allow a lot of time to visit sites as you go along.  Other walkers’ ideas in Wikiloc and elsewhere help, and a friend who is aiming to walk the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route this spring helpfully sent me a wonderfully ‘nerdy’ video on the best speed to walk, but most advice is from people who are not over the age of 65, and I think that on the INT 5km/hour is pretty optimistic – for me anyway.

Looking at the maps (in particular the contour lines!), I suspect around 20km is as much as we should sensibly take on for the first day of the next stage, conveniently taking us to the 886 where we can leave a car to get us to Safed for the night.  We have a few kilometres to make up from last time if we are to keep up with the Red Guide, and looking at the trail ahead I suspect that we will need to work hard over the three days we have set aside for walking.  I’m minded to try this for the first day.  Let’s see how it goes…

Well it’s been three weeks since we finished our first three days walking.  A brief What’sApp exchange and everyone committed to continuing our tiyul and to the next leg from 5 to 7 November.

I’m not sure November is a perfect time of year (July wasn’t great either of course) and we would have preferred the third week in October when we could expect better, drier, weather, but it just didn’t work out for the three of us. The first week or so in November is usually a bit of a watershed weather-wise in the Galil, so we may get beautiful blue skies and pleasant walking – alternatively we could be hiking in a downpour.  We’ll just have to see. At least we’ve booked a decent hotel in Safed for the two nights, the Ruth Rimon hotel.  I love wandering the narrow alleyways of Safed, its ethereal atmosphere, the legacy of Kabbalah – and the fact that there are plenty of restaurants within easy walking distance.

Looking back, during the first three days we walked through what were the extreme northern limits of historic Israel, the territories allocated to the tribes of Dan and Naftali.  There is evidence and stories of Jewish occupation going back millennia, in the Golan, Tel Dan, and in Kedesh near Malkiya, where we stayed.  Yet, in more modern terms we were in fact on the French side of the old Sykes/Picot line – something I’d not realised before.

A little aside about this now I’ve done some research.

The Hula pan handle was to be part of French Lebanon, as far South as Safed.  So, in 1919, the British relinquished the northern section of Upper Galilee containing Tel Hai, Metulla, Hamrah, and Kfar Giladi to French jurisdiction.  The Yishuv was very unhappy with this, since it  left the sources of the Jordan River outside the borders of British Mandatory Palestine, where the state envisaged in the Balfour Declaration was to be established.  Therefore, the few isolated Jewish settlements in the Upper Galilee assumed great strategic value from the Yishuv’s point of view.  Nevertheless, there was a fierce debate, some Jewish leaders advocating the retention of Tel Hai and the other outposts at all costs, while others regarded their situation as untenable and advocating withdrawal from them.

Arabs in this area at the time were not primarily involved in activities against the early Jewish settlements, but rather in strongly opposing the imposition of the French Mandate of Syria, which they regarded as betrayal of the McMahon–Hussein Correspondence made during the Arab Revolt against Ottoman rule.  In a letter dated 24 October 1915, Sir Henry McMahon, then His Majesty’s High Commissioner in Egypt, promises the Sharif of Mecca, Husayn ibn Ali, to “recognize and support the independence of the Arabs within the territories proposed by him (Sharif of Mecca).”  These territories included the Arabian peninsula, Syria (which then included Lebanon, Palestine, and Transjordan), and Iraq as “purely Arab” areas and part of a future Arab state or states in the region – although McMahon was clear Palestine was not included.

The settlers in Tel Hai, headed by the Russian-born Jewish commander Joseph Trumpeldor wanted the area to be restored to British control which they hoped would eventually lead to its becoming part of a future Jewish state. However, as newcomers to the area recently arrived from Europe, they were suspected of being pro-French, which ultimately led to armed clashes.

In one notable exchange, on 1 March 1920, Shiite Arabs from Jabal Amil in southern Lebanon sought to search Tel Hai, however the Jews called for reinforcements from kibbutz Kfar Giladi. Joseph Trumpeldor and ten men attempted to drive the Shi’ites militias away.

At the end of a verbal dispute, an armed confrontation broke out, in which six of the Tel Hai Jews were killed and the remaining Jews retreated, whereupon the place was burned. The total number of killed was 13 (5 Muslims and 8 Jews).  Nevertheless the end result was that the Jews persuaded the British and the French to agree this area of Upper Galilee should be included in Mandatory Palestine.  It was thus possible for Tel Hai to be resettled in 1921, though it did not become a viable independent community and in 1926 it was absorbed into kibbutz Kfar Giladi.

Now though we move South of the original Sykes/Picot line for three more days of walking.

We need to settle the itinerary in more detail, but broadly on our first day we aim to finish the stretch to Yesha Fort, and then to move on as far as Dishon, if we can.  On the second day we hope to do Nahal Tsivon; and our final leg will be up Mount Meron, which will not be fun if the weather is bad.  The autumn though will be much cooler and a better time to walk than the July heat of last time, and although we will still miss the spring flowers hopefully we can arrange a walking session next spring to see them then.

Overall, I’m really looking forward to resuming the INT.  My ankle is easier, and the tendon, although occasionally sore, less swollen and recovers faster from stress, so I’m optimistic it will be much improved by the time we walk.

Bring it on!

Breakfast was ready early for us today – as yesterday a friendly informal affair with two young girls (Kibbutzniks?) ensuring we had a sustaining start for the day.  We were again alone in the dining room, and Ronnie helped us to hard-boiled eggs and olives for the day.

I can see this is going to be a tradition.

There were initial hints the day might not be quite as hot as the previous two – there was scattered cloud cover – but the heat was as fierce as ever in the sun.

It being Friday we wanted to be back home for Shabbat, so we decided to shorten the trek, to stop 6 or 7 km short of Yesha Fort, and to make up the distance next time.  That meant dropping the car at a remote point on the trail where it coincided with a short stretch of secondary road.  It was close to an army base and we made sure we parked far enough away not to have it blown up.  The Peugeot was still playing up, with a light show of warning lights every so often, but as the previous day we ignored it.

Onward then North to Tel Hai to restart the trek.  The further we drove, and the steeper the sharp downward curves we went through, the more worrying the return trip loomed.  I was, frankly, a bit nervous – it looked like being a long hot day.  We were carrying extra water and so weight, my ankle was aching and the blister on my other foot hurt.  At least the blister evened out the limp.  Problem was my memory continued to fail – and now it wasn’t even a different thing I was forgetting each day – it was back to forgetting the walking pole.

The first 2km or so didn’t help; a steep descent along the path the wounded had been
evacuated from Tel Hai 100 years earlier, followed by a much steeper ascent – at least in shade. But, after that, the walking was beautiful; mainly dirt road or broad forest tracks with dappled shade and increasingly stunning views to make up for the fact we were climbing steadily, and at times steeply.

We moved out of the territory of the tribe of Dan into that of Naftali; the steep cliffs we were traversing and steadily climbing led up to the Lebanese border and the Lebanese villages we could see close by to our right and behind us.   Eventually Lebanon was hidden by steep cliffs and we walked in a land devoid of people – no farms, no villages, just the occasional signs of human impact in the forest – mountain bike runs, other trekking paths, abandoned iron mines, an occasional cattle grid and one cow (odd – no fields or grass), light woodland, and always on our left a steep drop and stunning views of the Hula valley.

Compared to days one and two, the peace was different – quiet forest and muffled sounds rather than more open country.  We came across three teenagers also hiking to Yesha, and then a summer camp activity centre in the forest close by the cable car from the valley to Manara with kids mountain biking, climbing, practising archery, and some just playing draughts and chilling out. We were using a lot of water and it was good to be able to replenish our supplies at the summer camp.

By this point the constant climbing was really impacting my tendon and with Ronnie’s help I found a suitable broken branch to use as a walking stick.  This worked well, and soon after we were on a long steady part broken tarmac part dirt road up to Mishkenot Haro’im.  The road was exposed to the sun, now high in the sky, and the heat started to become intense, but the views over the Hula to the Golan were magnificent and we made good time, finally moving off the road to a footpath in rocky but green and attractive countryside before reaching the car just before Yiftah, a somewhat truncated day to allow plenty of time to get home for Shabbat.

We drove back to pick up Rafi’s car and headed off home – in convoy in case my Peugeot misbehaved – via (how Israeli of course) a place Rafi knows that he assured us makes the best humous in Israel.

Overall a great three days.

What was good?  The scenery was spectacular, the long quiet periods of walking away from people – the INT here is off the beaten track (except when at the entrance to some of the Nature Reserves), the friendliness you so often find in the countryside where the pace of life is slower and people have time for each other, the opportunity to let your mind drift into inner reflection, and the pleasure of just travelling a beautiful country under your own steam at your (or Rafi and Ronnie’s) pace. Everywhere were little museums, archaeological ruins, sites of interest, potential detours – we could only taste a few or we would never have finished.

Most of all the feeling I have always had that Israel is our land, the true Jewish home, just grows as this amazing spider web of interlocking events and histories over millennia, of ancient sites and views, of historic names and of people coming back home from across the world, continues to grow and enmesh you.

What is not so good?  For nearly all the first three days we were walking within three miles of the Lebanese border.  Lebanese villages were at times just a few hundred metres away – quiet and peaceful in the sun.  But Hezbollah positions are clearly there too, just as close, and many of the Israeli kibbutzim, moshavim and towns seem extremely exposed and vulnerable.

The evidence of the history of violence and the terrors of the past are always close by. Whether it be biblical towns crushed by invaders, mediaeval fortresses or more modern historic encounters and losses.  Events such as at Tel Hai a hundred years ago; the memorial to the 73 special forces soldiers who died in the 1997 helicopter crash; the poignant photographs left by relatives at the memorial to the 12 paratroopers killed – again at Tel Hai – in 2006 in the Second Lebanese War (how could they have been allowed to gather at a point so plainly exposed to Hezbollah observers and Katyushas?); or the many individual memorials.  All along the way at beautiful viewpoints over the Hula and Golan there is tragic evidence of historic enmity and of young men who more recently gave their lives, and of their families torn apart, to protect this narrow finger of land between two enemies looking down in hatred and anger.

The problems we have had in starting our trek early continue.  Breakfast was a typical and excellent Israeli kibbutz affair – cream cheeses, grilled vegetables, humous, olives, eggs (boiled and omelettes) and all the rest – but it wasn’t until 7:30am.  We were the only guests there even at that time and we were pretty tired after our very early start the day before.  So we weren’t on our way from Malkiya until after 8:00am.

We left Rafi’s Forester at the Tel Hai cemetery where Yosef Trumpeldor is buried, and made our way to Kibbutz Dan to start our trek at the arch that formally marks the Northern beginning/end of the INT. There is a Museum at the entrance to Beit Ussiskin next to the start, but we decided to leave visiting that until our return in the afternoon to avoid the heat.

The walk through the morning was simply beautiful.  After just a short distance we reached Tel Dan, a city mentioned in the Bible and described as the northernmost city of kingdom of Israel and belonging to the tribe of Dan.  We decided to do no more than take a couple of photographs, planning to revisit the site properly on another occasion.  The trail then progressed around the edge of the Tel Dan Nature Reserve with a small tributary of the Dan river crossing our path and Lebanon just a few hundred metres away to our right.  We could see Lebanese villages and military listening posts on three sides and Rafi continued to display his
detailed knowledge of the area.  A few kilometres in the distance we could see Kfar Giladi, although it seemed to be on wheels as it apparently moved away as the trail weaved towards it.

It was all pretty rural. Lots of cattle grids, though few cows, birds, clusters of beehives and a well-marked, flat and easy trail until we reached the Snir nature reserve.

The Snir is the third of the three sources of the Jordan, with the Banias and the Dan, and Ronnie and I got in free with our Israel Nature cards –  even though Ronnie’s had expired.  But we had not realised that at this point the INT went down the middle of the Snir river, and that meant us each paying a pretty high price for rubber beach shoes at the small shop run by a photographer from Tel Aviv.

The early part of the trail in the reserve was crowded and full of Israeli schoolkids from local summer camps, but as we walked further down the river bed of the Snir the crowds disappeared again and, as before, we felt like the only people on the INT (which, admittedly, in July is not that surprising).

The trail through the Snir was rough and uneven, sometimes we were clambering over rocks and sometimes wading up to our knees – but the water was delightfully cool, and there was plenty of shade from the trees growing along the banks of the river. Where the INT finally left the river we ate the eggs we had taken at breakfast whilst sitting in the shade and then moved on.

At the entrance to Kibbutz Ma’ayan Baruch we found two unspent ammunition rounds and left them at the deserted entrance gate.  The INT guidebook told us there is a world-class Natural History museum there but it was getting late and again over 40C and so we decided to press on.  Although we were taking time out to see a lot of things along way, there is simply so much to see along the INT that it would take months to walk if you stopped to visit each of the sites.

It remained pretty easy walking, but for the oppressive heat that came up from the tarmac once we hit a paved road, and there was though a final climb up to Kfar Giladi.  We arrived at the adjacent Tel Hai cemetery just as the heat of the day peaked, without the long hot afternoon hike of the day before having covered over 22km.

Kibbutz Kfar Giladi was founded in 1916 by members of Hashomer on land owned by the Jewish Colonization Association.  The area was subject to intermittent border adjustments between the British and the French, and in 1919, the British relinquished the northern section of the Upper Galilee containing Tel Hai, Metula, Hamra, and Kfar Giladi to French jurisdiction.

After the Arab attack on Tel Hai in 1920, it was temporarily abandoned. Ten months later, the settlers returned.  Between 1916 and 1932, the population totalled 40–70. In 1932, the kibbutz absorbed 100 newcomers, mainly young immigrants.  Yet, from 1922 to 1948, between 8,000 and 10,000 Jewish immigrants from Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, Iraq, Afghanistan and Eastern Europe were smuggled into Palestine through Kibbutz Giladi, circumventing the British Mandatory ban on Jewish immigration.  In an operation known as Mivtzah HaElef, 1,300 Jewish children were smuggled out of Syria between 1945 and 1948.  At the kibbutz, the children were dressed in work clothes and hidden in the kibbutz chicken coops and cowsheds.

Tel Hai cemetery, where we had left the Peugeot and finished the trail that day, evoked mixed emotions in me.  The story of Yosef Trumpeldor and his roaring lion is inspiring and far enough away in time not to be too personal.  In contrast, the memorials to the twelve reservists who died in its shadow when hit by a Katyusha rocket in the 2006 Lebanon war is too recent; the evidence of family loss – fading flowers and photographs – tragic and extremely moving.  We noticed the 12th anniversary of their deaths – their Yahzeit – was the following week

Getting back to Malkiya was pretty easy as the other car in Kibbutz Dan was just a very short drive back.  However, our intention to visit the Beit Ussisikin Museum foundered on a petty bureaucratic approach to our attempt to buy senior tickets, and so we made our way back early instead for a swim.

The Kibbutz had a a great little supermarket, and the ladies running it were extremely friendly, offering me bunches of sweet wine grapes, after which I joined Rafi and Ronnie by the pool.  As Ronnie observed, there, as with all public swimming pools in Israel, loud pop music seems to be compulsory.

That evening we headed to Dubrovin’s Farm, one of the first farms in the Hula valley, for dinner.  It was established by Andrei Dubrovin (1863–1967) who moved to Ottoman Palestine with his family in 1903 from Astrakhan.  He and his family were Subbotniks, Russian Christians who kept seventh-day Sabbath.  After their conversion to Judaism they took Hebrew names. Andrei became “Yoav”, and his wife became “Rachel”. The family farm, of 650 dunams, was located near a malaria-ridden swamp and two of Dubrovin’s sons and two grandchildren died of the illness. He eventually moved most of his family to Rosh Pinna, leaving behind his eldest son, Yitzhak, to manage the buildings, fruit orchards, and gardens.

Yitzhak bequeathed the Dubrovin Estate to the Jewish National Fund and the farm was converted into a museum that commemorates the early pioneers.  Yet, in the grounds of the museum, are the ruins of a synagogue dating between the 4th and 6th centuries, highlighting the historic Jewish settlement in the region.   The place is wonderfully atmospheric with an air of history, and the kosher restaurant, run by a young family, is excellent.

18 July 2018: Neve Nimrod to Kibbutz Dan (~15km)Well, today, after a lot of anticipation (and with some trepidation on my part) we started the Israel National Trail.

Getting to the start was not entirely straightforward.  Conscious of the likely heat (it was to reach 42C!) we wanted to start early, and that meant a 4:15am start for me to drive to Ronnie’s home in Pardes Hanna where I met him and Rafi.  A quick coffee, and then we drove two cars up to the Galil, grabbing another coffee, and a croissant, just before Kiryat Shemona.

Strictly, the trek we planned for our first day is not part of the INT, which starts at Kibbutz Dan.  However, the superb Guide book ‘Hike the Land of Israel:  The Israel National Trail’ by Saar and Henkin (essentially the INT bible), recommends starting in the Golan with a one-day hike from Neve Nimrod.  So, that was our plan.

We started the day with a bit of a car dance. We left my Peugeot in Kibbutz Dan (at the official start to the INT) and then drove on in Rafi’s Forester to Neve Nimrod to start the walk.

Even then there was a false start as after about ten minutes I realised I’d left a water bottle in Rafi’s car and needed to go back for it.  That wasn’t my only memory lapse – I also left my walking pole (brought to help with an inflamed Achilles tendon in my left ankle) in the car; but by the time I had remembered that it was too late to go back.  A sign of age… although apparently it’s OK if you forget a different thing each day, just so long as you don’t forget the same thing every day…

So, although we had hoped to be on the trail by around 8:00am, it was three quarters of an hour later that we finally set out on a very pleasant downhill stroll to Ein Kiniya, a pleasant and apparently affluent Druse  village of just under 2,000 people.  It is one of the four Druze-Syrian communities on the Israeli Golan Heights, together with Majdal Sams, Majdal and Buq’ata.  On the way, Rafi pointed out a number of sites and villages we could see on the way, as the entire northern Galilee and part of Lebanon spread out before us.
There was a delightful peace about Ein Kiniya.  Druse flags and also a variety of national flags – Portuguese, French, and others – flew from different houses, reflecting we guessed different World Cup loyalties.  The village was quiet and peaceful, and an elderly farmer in the main street offered us peaches from his tractor trailer.  It was the first example of what we came quickly to discover. The entire INT experience may be drawn by the trail, but it is coloured in and brought to life by encounters and experiences along the way, with people and with history.

From the village we walked uphill along a good road to Nimrod Castle, a massive fortress built around 1229 by Al-Aziz Uthman, the younger son of Saladin, to pre-empt an attack on Damascus by the armies of the Sixth Crusade. 
In 1260 the Mongols captured the castle, dismantled some of its defenses and left their ally, the son of Al-Aziz ‘Uthman, in charge of it and the nearby town of Banias.  After the subsequent Mamluk victory over the Mongols at the Battle of Ain Jalut, Sulthan Baibars strengthened the castle and added larger towers.  At the end of the 13th century, following the Muslim conquest of the port city of Acre (Akko) and the end of Crusader rule in the Holy Land, the fortress lost its strategic value and fell into disrepair.  It was badly damaged by an earthquake in the 18^thCentury.

We spent around 45 minutes touring the Castle – particularly struck by the stupendous views, the apparent impregnability of the site and the quality of the construction.  The water cisterns were still full – albeit the stagnant water is now mainly a home for endangered salamanders…

We probably stayed too long at Nimrod.  Higher up there had been a freshness to the air and a very pleasant breeze.  Now it was getting hotter, the wind was dying and, as we descended the steep and rock-strewn trail from Nimrod, the temperature rose rapidly and the walk became much more strenuous.

It took around an hour and a half to reach Banias at the foot of the mountain and it was a real pleasure to find the refreshment hut in the National Park.  Coming in from the INT we found we had avoided the payment booths – unlike at Nimrod where Rafi had to pay (although Ronnie and I had free entry because of our annual Israel Nature Parks passes).

I hadn’t been to Banias for nearly 50 years and had forgotten how interesting it is.  There is the spring, a source of the Jordan, and beautiful ponds, falls and trails. There are also the remains of a temple built by Herod the Great, of his son Philippi’s capital (Caesarea Philipi) and of a Crusader city.

But, it was now both past midday and seriously hot and so we pressed on, following the stream.  We passed under  a beautiful Roman bridge, and then the only surviving workable water-powered flour mill in Israel – the Matroof mill – and the Officer’s Pool used by Syrian officers before 1967.

In all we walked around 3.5km through a beautiful and verdant canyon (with a suspended path over some striking rapids) before branching off towards Kibbutz Dan.  It was uneventful until around 0.5 km from the car when I got extreme cramp (I don’t think I’d eaten enough) which didn’t really let off until we arrived, around an hour or two hour later than we had originally hoped, at the Beit Ussiskin car park at the real start of the INT where we’d left the Peugeot.  It was seriously hot but we had covered a decent distance and lost over a kilometre in height: here is what we did.

We now though had to drive back to Neve Nimrod to collect Rafi’s car, and then drive south again past Dan for around 30 minutes to reach our accommodation for two nights at Malkiya, a kibbutz around 25 minutes south high up close to the Lebanese border.  By then I was getting an interesting but intermittent display of warning lights on the Peugeot dashboard.

Malkiya is a friendly and delightful place, with green lawns and simple but large clean chalet rooms with an en suite shower and a kitchenette.

We were pretty tired and our plans for a quiet afternoon reading by the pool had not worked out.  Basically, we just crashed out, showered and went for an early dinner.

On our way we visited the memorial at Malkiya and chatted to a lady who had been at the kibbutz for 60 years who was having a video made for her birthday.  The views are spectacular over the entire Hula valley and the Golan Heights, and the history of the place so typical for the kibbutzim in the area.

The kibbutz was established in March 1949 by six former Palmach soldiers who had been demobilised at the end of the War of Independence.  It is named after the depopulated Arab village of al-Malkiyya, which in turn had retained the name of the Jewish biblical village of Malkiya – a priestly family from biblical times (Nehemiah 10:4) – on whose lands it was established.  The important Canaanite and biblical city of Kedesh lies just below it.

The memorial photographed here says more about its foundation.

After dinner we sat outside and drank a glass of wine each – made from grapes grown by the kibbutz and given us when we checked in.  It was a beautiful still night.  It was hard to believe we were just a couple of hundred metres from Lebanon.  During the evening we heard gunfire.  Training?  A celebration in the nearby Lebanese villages?  Skirmishes in the Golan?  We didn’t know.  It was surreal.