Haifa

After two and a half weeks of traveling with a group and then staying with friends, a few days ago I finally broke out on my own. One of the reasons that I extended my trip after Birthright was to explore the north coast of Israel, particularly Akko and Caesarea, both of which I'd read magazine articles about before I left (in the CNN travelers magazine and National Geographic respectively). I'll write about both of those in separate posts, but first to Haifa, which I decided to make my base for exploring.

I arrived here on Sunday, three days ago. After dropping my bags at the comfortable and welcoming hostel, I went to explore the city. I knew almost nothing about this place before I came, other than the information in my guidebook, and I almost immediately didn't like it. I passed nothing beautiful on my walk, kept getting lost on the badly signposted streets, everything I wanted to see was shut, and I kept getting hit on in aggressive and not even flattering ways.

Haifa is not exclusively a Jewish place, a fact I probably wouldn't have noticed had it not been for my exclusively Jewish surroundings until that point. It is also the most holy site of the Baha'i, a religion I hadn't even heard about before I arrived here. Almost no Baha'i live in Haifa, although the religion's six million followers are all expected to make pilgrimage here at least once in there lives. In my dorm room, there's me and eight Baha'i pilgrims. The religion seems to be based on taking the best bits of all the other religions. It's a faith which holds unity and equality as their central belief, which at least in principle is hard to fault. Also, nobody can be born into the religion. You have to choose to be Baha'i and can only do so once you're 15, which I think is eminently sensible.

Haifa is dominated by the absolutely stunning Baha'i Gardens which occupies 19 massive terraces on the side of Mount Carmel. I strongly recommend that you search for images of this beautiful place. I went for a tour and they really are a sight to behold.

I warmed up a bit (though not a lot) to Haifa after the first day, largely on account of a delicious frozen yogurt made with fresh figs and dates, pecan and halva. The highlight of my time in the city was at the University of Haifa, where there is an observation point which looks out over a view actually worth seeing, an excellent archaeological museum (including a remarkably intact and well preserved ship that is 2400 years old), and an outdoor trail into Mount Carmel National Park, along which a collection of remains of ancient buildings from around Israel have been reconstructed.

But the best bit about being based in Haifa has been the time I haven't actually been there, and it is to trips to Akko and Caesarea that I now turn (in separate posts).