I went to Israel- post 1

No joke! A couple of weeks ago we went to Israel.

Light and stone in Jerusalem. Pretty much everywhere.
It was amazing. The last time we traveled to Israel, Dave and I were both 23 years old.  We ended up staying 2 years. We returned to the US just before our 25th birthdays, planning to to bounce back and forth living between countries as often as we could. But.. .life happened.  It took till this year, when a son who is himself 25,  gave us an envelope with already purchased airline tickets in our names, for the trip. We were speechless, in fact I still can't believe it, and we are already there and back! Also- the son? A keeper.

My closest friend from the Jerusalem days is a photographer there. She welcomed us into her home in the Baka neighborhood, and we joined in daily life. Above, our room in her tile floored flat, and the view from our window.

Debbi and her home.

You can wander all over Jerusalem without ever getting bored. And we did.  So many alley ways .

Our old neighborhood, Nahlaot. It has become bohemian chic. Our former landlords' flat is now the shoemaker's entrance. It is surreal to travel as middle aged tourists for a week, to a place you lived for months and months as, let's say, a more colorful young person.

Israel is easy to visit- and if you love handmade, even more so. Handcraft is celebrated everywhere. But so is wireless technology, and it makes life very comfortable when traveling. 

What photographers do when we get together. 
Apparently, Dave and I  looked more at home than we thought. We were constantly asked where we were from. We'd answer the US, and the reply would be "No, where are you from Here" meaning, they thought we were ex-pats. Dave's beard, which is long enough to exude a Jerusalem-like spiritual quest (but is, in fact, just a beard)  and my rusty but surprisingly returned Hebrew skills helped, I think.

Dave with street art on the closed shutters of the Mahane Yehuda Market, at night. More about this next post.

 Looking plenty touristy, hiking in Ein Gedi, a national park oasis in the Negev desert. Improved access has made it popular (good--but also a little sad). The water levels are so much lower-- we were looking forward to swimming in the waterfall pools. You can see we would have looked pretty silly if we'd tried.

In Jerusalem I wallked by one yarn shop, filled with  mostly acrylics and other non-wool blends, so I wasn't terribly interested (snob? yes) . They had a display, above left,  of what looked like cotton jersey bias trims wound into skeins , called Colombialand. It was very tempting. I wasn't sure what I'd do with it. Someone used it (I think) to yarn bomb/stitch bus benches in the neighborhood I was staying in. Brilliant!-the perforated metal became a canvas.

Street art on the shutters for Moses Eggs in the market at night.

I'll need to have a part 2--thanks for hanging in if you made it this far!