Kefar Blum Kayaks and Menara Cliff

August 3, 2010

Hard to believe, but we had yet another whirlwind day. We are certainly taking advantage of our time in Israel by not letting a moment go to waste. We are all exhausted and running on no sleep, but a delicious Israeli breakfast took care of much of that this morning.

After devouring an enormous quantity of food, we set off for Kefar Blum Kayaks where we went rafting down the Jordan River. It was truly a highlight of our trip. The kids had an amazing time, especially when we went down the waterfall! We emerged from the river an hour and 15 minutes later, wet, but feeling great.

Back on dry land, we bought tickets for the EXTREME sports that they had there. Joshua, yes he is only 6, saw the zip line off the tall tower into the river and just had to try it. Leora and Yehuda were not too far behind. They loved it! Next they tried their hands at archery, rock climbing, and and rope climb with harnesses around the park. Crazy stuff, but they had an amazing time. Zachary, Benjamin and I chose to be the photographers instead. After a yummy ice cream treat, we proceeded to our next stop...Menara Cliff in Kiriyat Shemona (right by the border of Lebanon).

Menara Cliff is the home of the longest, and steepest cable car in all of Israel. It certainly was a long, steep, and HOT ride to the top. Did I mention that Israel is having a crazy heat wave with high temperatures and high humidity? Just our luck... At the top of the cliff we headed straight for the Kibbutz Menara pool for a quick dip so that we could walk around wet and stay cool. While in the pool we heard very loud booms that sounded like bombs -- later we found out about the katusha rocketsthat were fired from Lebanon. Pretty scary. Its a good thing we didn't find out until later. Last stop was the Alpine Slide down the mountain. What fun!

Our next excitement was arriving at a restaurant for dinner only to realize that Yehuda had lost his wallet somewhere. The restaurant owner was amazing and said that we should eat anyway and pay him later, but we retraced our steps (by phone) and Kefar Blum told us that someone had turned in his wallet (thank G-d). Benjamin the piped up and said, "Yeah, Daddy dropped it at the ice cream store and I told him to pick it up. He did but then he dropped it again." When I asked Benjamin if he told Daddy again, he said, "No, I was too tired!"

After dinner we returned to the hotel at about 8:00 PM. But...that was too short a day for the Kohn's. We changed into bathing suits and went for a night swim!!!! After nice hot showers the kids all collapsed into bed :)