Things are going South

Internet was bad yesterday, so I'll try and catch up today.

We left the Sea of Galilee and headed south. Our first stop was an amazing city called Bet Shean. During Jesus' time it was one of the Decapolis, a series of Greek citys in near the lake. It was an amazing city during Byzantine times, but was destroyed by an earthquake. It's a great place to visit. In Old Testament times King Saul's body was hung on the wall of the OT era city after his death.

Then off to the oldest city in the world Jericho. Not much to look at, but a great place to visit. It was also out first encounter with a really annoying tourist shopping place.

 A sycamore tree in the center of modern Jericho.No, it's not 2000 years old.

Next, we stopping at the banks of the lower Jordan River, near where Jesus was baptized. Today this water is not very clean.

After that, we continued south for a dip in the waters of the Dead Sea. See if you can pick out the floaters in our group.

We spent the night at a mediocre hostel. Masada and Jerusalem tomorrow.