Caves
Caves have served across Israel’s history as burial sites, refuges, columbaria, hideouts and workshops, often cut deliberately into the country’s soft chalk. Posts here include the Shfela’s Roman and Byzantine-period cave systems, where whole underground villages survive beneath the surface.
6 articles
6 articles
The Hebrew University on Mt Scopus
A walking tour of the Hebrew University on Mt Scopus with a local guide: the botanical gardens, the Cave of Nicanor, the tombs of Ussishkin and Pinsker, and the amphitheatre.
Eastern Lower Galilee
A field trip around the eastern lower Galilee, the basalt-cliff region between the Sea of Galilee and the central Galilee: Mount Arbel and its ancient synagogue, the Druze shrine of Nabi Shu'aib, ancient Korazim, Domus Galilaeae and Tel Mutilla.
The Shfela (Judean Lowlands) in the Roman & Byzantine Periods
A day across the Judean Lowlands: Tel Maresha's underground caves, the Roman city of Beit Guvrin (Eleutheropolis), and crawling through the Bar Kochba Revolt tunnels at Horvat Midras.
South Mount Hebron
Returning from glandular fever for a complex field-trip to the South Hebron Hills: the Cave of Machpela, Tel Rumeida, the Byzantine ruins of Susya and Anim, and the illegal outpost at Avigail. Politics unavoidable, the day deeply absorbing.
The Jordan Valley
A field trip down the Jordan Valley: the Byzantine monasteries of Martyrius, St Euthymius and St Gerassimos; the baptism site at Qasr el Yahud; the Jordan Valley Monument; and an evening sing-song at the Mabua spring.
Mount Sedom
Our third trip on the guiding course took us back to the Dead Sea region: the Meitzad Zohar viewpoint, the badlands of Nachal Peratzim, a hike across the salt mountain of Mount Sedom and a final stop at the Dead Sea factories.
If you are going to Israel, you would be mad not to give him a call.
Amol Rajan, BBC presenter and broadcaster
Having been on trips in Israel with seven different tour guides, Samuel stood above all the rest.
Seasoned Israel traveller
Samuel is one part walking encyclopedia, one part storyteller, one part stand-up comedian.
Berkeley Haas Business School student