We went with the students on the Shephelah (meaning low land) Field Trip. The best way to geographically describe what we did is by using your hand. If your finger tips end at the Mediterranean Sea, then your finger knuckles are the 5 ancient shephelah's or low land cities: Lacish, Mareshah, Azekah, Beth Shemesh and lower Beth-Horon. Your knuckles on your hand are the big cities of Debir, Hebron, Bethlehem, Jerusalem and upper Beth-Horon. These low land cities or fortresses protected the upper larger cities from Philistines that controlled the Mediterranean coastal plain of Philistia. These places are for the most part archaeological digs. The most famous is Lacish. It was the largest of the lowland cities. 18 "ostraca's" or pottery shards used as writing tablets were found in Lacish known as the Lacish Letter's. One of the valleys (between your fingers) is were Samson lived (Sorek) and the David and Goliath story happened in the next valley over(Elah). Not a lot left to see, just stories to tell,
Some giant cactus--ouch. I believe this is the plant that grows the prickly pear.
The boys enjoyed watching this plane do a little crop dusting.
Along the path to the top of a hill is the story of David and Goliath. They light the candles at night and have moonlight walks.
While the students were being lectured Seth found a camillion. It was very frisky and kept trying to bite him. He had long claws that scratched him and John. Can you see him in the first picture?
The great hunter looking for more prey.
Our last two stops were at some caves. The first series of caves included large caves with pigeon holes (thousands of them), giant underground cisterns used for storing water and dwellings.
The National Parks Flag.
Going down! It was a hot, dry day in the 90's so the caves were a welcome relief.
All the walls were lined with pigeon holes. They aren't sure if they were used for letter sending (sorry no owls), ritual sacrifice, food, fertilizer, all the above or something else. While it was cool and refreshing when we went in, I can't imagine what it would be like with thousands of birds.
A hole were the water would come through.
Coming out of the caves.
Down, down, down into the water cistern.
One of the openings to the cave.
What remains of an old church.
The sun light shines in from far, far above.
The grand descending stair case.
Off to the next cave.
These last pictures are from some caves down the road. They are actually chalk mines. After about 3 feet of hard rock there are massive amounts of chalk they would dig out and use for plastering the buildings. These dome caverns are what remain.
If You Could Hie to Kolob. The students are well know for singing wherever they go. This was in one of the water cisterns.
High up in the caverns were some pigeons, the kids thought they saw bats as well.
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