Trip to the North

Still in time for a little description of last weekend's trip: we went hiking.
Ok, done!

After having a hard time with the car rental company, all the three cars left Haifa heading the north of Israel.
For Friday, we went on a hike in the national park around the Montfort Castle. The castle itself is just a ruined ancient castle, but the hike is great.
About half the hike is at the side of a very small river that we can jump over. There's a huge natural wall where the very old layers of sediment can be clearly seen, like steps.
But, apart from the amazing panoramic view from the castle, the star of the trip is the tiny and long cave that leads into the start of the river.
For those who went inside, like I did, this cave makes it worth the effort: clear fresh water with little fish swimming around your legs. I actually tasted the water and it's perfect. Of course there are no pictures of the cave... But you can see the waxing gibbous moon next to the castle and some people smoking a "nargilla" there.

After the hike, some went to a small town where there is a bar/restaurant called Chocolata. They only have chocolate: chocolate with coffee, with ice cream, chocolate lasagna, chocolate soup, chocolate more-than-you-can-imagine.
The rest of the people, like me, went directly to Yehudia, to the camping to have showers and settle for the night. It was a nice night, with the essential vodka and "nargilla".

Few hours after going to sleep, a new hiking trip is waiting. Actually, almost everyone of the 15 people went for sight-seeing and only the remaining 5 went for the hike.
Absolutely amazing hike! Astonishing! Basically we went down the river in the Yehudia National Park. There was a place where we really swam with our backpacks because there was no other possible way!

The hike first attraction is the waterfall. We sat there to eat and rest a little.
After the waterfall, the path is through the river for a long time. At least in the summer, it's a very small river, that we can easily cross jumping. However, here and there are natural pools where people can stop to swim and rest on the sun.

The biggest of the pools has to be crossed... swimming. There's no way around. Everyone must swim or go back. And that's not all, to reach it, you must go down some scary vertical metal stairs. Incredibly nice!
Of course, once again I don't have pictures of the best part because the camera had to be inside the back-pack in a special plastic bag so it doesn't get wet. (Luis, you didn't read this, ok? The camera didn't suffer, not a single drop of whater, perfect.) Yes, we knew we'd have to swim, so we where prepared: some empty bottles of whater, water resistant plastic bags and you have a little water resistant boat.
After the pool, we sat once again to eat and rest and take some sun and bathe and dry clothes.

This was a real hike. You can't just walk straight, many of the times, you have to use your hands to hold on better, climb, jump... All on rocks, no dust to interfere and make it dangerous.

Main attractions done!
Now all we have is some more walking on the rocks side by side with a residual river, some more natural swimming pools and the return.
The return is something like climbing a few hundreds of meters to the top again at the 1pm sun. Hard climb, half an hour. Great great view. This was the last attraction of the place: the view. All of us, even burning in the sun, promised to get back. For me, I promised to get back if I come to Israel again. May happen.