The Laughlins

Mark and I took another daytrip to Ein Kerem, which I mentioned before in the Hadassah Hospital post. This is where we wanted to go after we saw the Chagall Windows, but we realized that we were not within the bus route that would take us there. Anyways, we did find the right bus and visited Ein Kerem for the day. Ein Kerem is a beautiful and heavily-wooded town on the western outskirts of Jerusalem. It is the town that Elizabeth and Zacharias lived in and the traditional birthplace of John the Baptist, and therefore, potentially where Mary would have visited Elizabeth after she found out that she was pregnant. You can read more about Ein Kerem at Wikipedia. We started by having lunch at the "Anasheem" restaurant, which means "people" in Hebrew. This place had been recommended to us by a number of Israelis as one of their favorite restaurants in Jerusalem. We got a a pizza margherita: tomato, sliced mozzarella, basil and oil - one of our favorites anywhere we go. It was REALLY good!! The best pizza in all of Jerusalem thus far! It was over-baked in a big fire-oven and tasted very flavorful. After that, we walked to the a church that I still haven't identified yet (with the blue door). It was quite overgrown with weeds and closed off to the public for the most part. We made our way up a hill, stopping at Mary's Spring (where the dogs were drinking) and the Music Center, which is open for concerts throughout the year. We continued on to the Church of the Visitation, which we happened to hit at lunchtime, so we were not able to go inside of the actual church - I just took pictures of the grounds surrounding it. I like the "Do Not..." signs - what is with the swimsuit? Anyways, we then walked up another steep and winding road to the gates of the Russian Monastery. This too had one of the great "No Swimsuits" signs. You have to call ahead to get inside, because the two church buildings within the grounds are set off from the road quite a ways, so we didn't go in. One of the churches on the grounds (pictured below) has multiple maroon-domed peaks with gold crosses. You can also see more pictures of this church in the Hadassah Hospital post. We then hiked up a hillside behind the youth hostel and walked along trails until we got back to the main part of town. We stopped at a little coffee shop while we waited for the St. John the Baptist church to open (it was still lunchtime). We toured this church, looking at the mosaics they had there, as well as a Byzantine tomb (that was gated off). We played on a playground for a while and then took a bus back to our apartment. Overall, it was a very cute little town with a lot of art studios and shops, and we'll visit again sometime!