Sun March 4 – First ‘full’ day in Jerusalem

Weather: Mid-70’s

I say first ‘full’ day because we didn’t get ready and out of the room until 2:30p.m. It was great to have the cushion to be able to sleep as long as we needed rest and get settled before the rest of the group arrived.

When my eyes opened around 10:30am that morning to the sounds of doors slamming repeatedly, all I could think was ‘I need to get down to reception and go switch our room.’ Amy is still sleeping, so I quietly leave the room and can see several of the rooms down our hallway with doors ajar. I decide to do my own little investigations on ‘upgrade’ possibilities. I sneakily peak into the rooms that have been vacated and are ready for cleaning. One room, at the very end of the hallway seems like our quietest option. All of the rooms are spartan, so it’s not like a luxury upgrade. At this point, I’ll just take quiet.

I explain my plight to the gentleman at reception. I tell him we’d like to move to another room down at the end of the hall. He tells me, ‘Sadly, that is not possible because we are booked full.’ I say, ‘Hmm, I know a group of 24 are checking in tonight. Is it possible we could shift into one of those rooms? Our room has problems, the sink doesn’t drain and we had no hot water for showers last night. I think someone needs to work on the room.’ He says, ‘Okay, let me see what I can do. How soon can you move?’ I respond with, ‘immediately’ as I envision me running back upstairs to the room and pulling Amy out of her bed with the same intensity as if the building were on fire, if this is a go. He says, ‘I will come to your room when I have an answer.’

I go back upstairs and try to get back in the room, and now the key won’t go into the lock. I find the maid on the floor cleaning the rooms. She tries to help but now thinks the lock is broken. Again I think, ‘Where am I?’ She goes down to try and solve the problem and I start banging on the door to see if Amy can open it from the inside. She gets to the door all disheveled, and opens the door. I had woken her up, but it was time to get up anyway. We didn’t want to sleep too late to try to get on the schedule.

I tell her I’m in the middle of a negotiation to get us a new room. Just then the man at the front desk knocks on the front door. Are you able to move now so the maids can get in to clean your room before the guests arrive?  I can give you the room at the end of the hall.  We look at each then back at him and nod enthusiastically in agreement.

The room he gave us was even more quiet as it didn’t face the inner courtyard where tour groups gather in the morning. We walked in and where thrilled, it was a little bigger and we wouldn’t have to do the awkward dance around each other. It also had this ultimate ledge running across the back of the room. Plenty of storage for our ‘things.’ We also envisioned a desk as our little makeshift vanity station. We were now giddy with our new accommodation. It is amazing how just a few shifts in your situation (a little more room, a working sink, hot water, a working lock, a ledge for storage) can give you a whole new perspective and appreciation for what you DO have that you didn’t have before.

We ‘yelped’ a place for lunch and got instructions on how to walk there. This was a Sunday and we were walking through the Jewish quarter. It was immediately evident how family oriented they are. So many families with so many little ones walking along and enjoying the afternoon sunshine. I could have people watched all afternoon. It was so sweet to watch multi-generations interacting, little kids walking along arm in arm, laughing and playing with parents walking behind them or near by. It felt absolutely safe to walk around within this quarter.

We made it to the lunch place around 4pm. It took a while for someone to show up to help us, but when he did show up, he served up beautiful plates of food. The food was truly delicious. However, our stomachs both felt a little off later, and we wondered if it was this place that caused the havoc, as we had a very late lunch and noticed it seemed the food had been sitting out for several hours.

We then found out there was a beautiful outdoor mall just outside of the Jaffe Gate. We got a little giddy at the thought of an outdoor mall – still seeking some comforts of home, I suppose. It indeed felt very familiar to stroll through there and experience some of the familiar sites and sounds of home in a new context. Fun coffee shops galore, restaurants, and stores you’d see at Fashion Island in Newport Beach. I even saw a coffee/bagel shop and got completely giddy in the realization that we are probably in the world’s bagel capital! Must try bagel for breakfast, stat!

After strolling around and doing some fun spontaneous shopping, we headed back to our room.  A girl needs Dead Sea hand lotion when in Jerusalem right? After resting for a bit, we grabbed our jackets and headed back to the mall for coffee and tea and dinner. We needed to stay up until 10:15pm, the time of our orientation. The rest of the group was landing at Tel Aviv airport at 8:30pm so it would take some time to get there.

Walking back over to the mall, we were again struck by all of the families out everywhere. They seemed to all be enjoying each other’s company so much and the children all seem so well-behaved in restaurants.

We picked a place to have a coffee and tea and our enthusiastic waitress talked me into a dessert to enjoy with them. At first I was no, I’m good, knowing dinner was next. But she insisted, ‘But you have come to the best dessert house in ALL of Israel. It is famous. Last month we had BIG donuts. But we don’t have the donuts anymore. Regardless, come look at our case of desserts.’ So I get up to go look, I hated to quench her enthusiasm. I picked out a tiramisu that was soon brough over with a side of whipped cream. It indeed was so good, we shared it and I ended up ordering a second cappucino. When in Israel… And let me say, they do have the coffee thing down.

We went to a second place for dinner, this place had a cool vibe inside and I thought it was funny that the ceiling matched Amy’s top. Again this place had several Jewish families eating out together. The food was okay, probably because I was stuffed on tiramisu and cappuccinos.

We then walked back to the guest house for our orientation. The travelers had arrived. Our new guide gave us the itinerary for the next day and told us to be downstairs and ready for breakfast by 7:30am. She also gave us our welcome pack – a backpack, baseball cap, map of Jerusalem, and study guidebook.

After returning to the room, it was now almost 11pm and Amy was going to shower. I got washed up quick and let her have the bathroom. As I laid in my bed I could hear her running the water for a shower, she was probably in there 3 minutes when she lost hot water! And it was a ‘hair wash’ night. Oh no. We realized at that moment, getting to the hot water first was going to be our new survival strategy priority. With a full house, it was obviously taxing their hot water supply.

We both took sleep aids again to get us on the time schedule as we didn’t have time to waste, just a few hours before we needed to get up and put in a full day. Tomorrow we would be visiting the City of David, Jerusalem Archeological Park, Hezekiah’s Tunnel, the Pool of Siloam, and the Western Wall.