Israel - Day 3 - The Sea of Galilee

On Day 3, we all woke up, had breakfast, & got ready for a day at sea.  Unfortunately, Canyon woke up with a stomach ache.  He still ate breakfast, but we could tell he wasn't at 100%.

We all hopped into the bus & drove to the Sea of Galilee.  Our hotel was right next to the Sea so it was a very short drive to get to the dock.  As we were driving, Canyon ended up puking into Trek's metal water bottle.  We felt so bad for him.  We didn't know if it was constipation, his body adjusting to new foods, or if he was indeed sick. (There were several families on our tour bus who came feeling sick so it was only a matter of time until everyone on the bus had it.). We made him sit away from everyone else on the bus & he wore a mask just in case it was the sickness going around.

We drove passed Magdala on our way to the sea.  This is where Mary Magdalen was from.

Our first stop was a museum that had a 1st century fishing boat know as the "Jesus Boat" that had been discovered in the mud of the Sea of Galilee.  2 fisherman had stumbled upon it when the seas waters were low.  Once they realized what they had found, they raced with a team of archaeologists to get the boat out of the mud before the water level rose again.  It took them 12 days.  The ancient wood was extremely fragile so they had to spray it with foam to protect it properly when trying to move it.  The foam also helped them to float the boat to where they needed it to be to move it.  They then submerged the boat in a wax bath for 12 years which protects the boat so it can now be on display in a museum.

This is what the foam covering looked like when they were trying to move the boat from the mud to land.

After seeing the 1st Century boat, we all climbed aboard the NOAH (an old wood boat) to explore the Sea of Galilee.  The kids were all excited for a nice boat ride.

And my girls of course wanted to reenact The Titanic movie.

I was worried that the boat would make Canyon queezy & sea sick since his stomach was already bugging him, but he was totally fine on the boat.  In fact, you would have never known he was feeling sick that morning.  He was running around playing, dancing, & having a great time.

The captain of the boat asked Craiger to come & raise the American flag to fly next to the Israel flag for our voyage across the Sea of Galilee, then we listened to the National Anthem play as we took off from the port.  It was kind of funny to hear our National Anthem on a boat in Israel.

Our tour guide Salim had told us to bring bread from breakfast to feed the seagulls.  We were definitely not expecting the attention we got from the birds.  I think all the kids on our boat were in heaven watching them fly next to us.

You can see 2 "mounts" in this picture.  One is where the Sermon
on the Mount took place, the other is where the miracle of 
the Loaves & Fishes happened.

Our captain also showed us how they would have fished back in bible times.  He had a net & cast it into the sea.  It was very exciting.  We didn't catch anything, but it was really cool to see how it was done.

We made port in Capernaum.  This would be the next stop on our journey.  We couldn't wait to see all the places of our Savior's ministry.  It was going to be an exciting day.