Upper Hula Valley and Golan

In about three days I walked all the way from the Nashot junction down to the Pkak bridge up to Nahal Sa'ar down to Qiryat Shmona. If you happen to be inspecting a topographic map of the Golan Heights right now, you may still have no clue what I'm talking about. 

In the Golan, the sky was gray and hazy and the land was dry and flat except for a eucalyptus grove across the road. Many areas of Israel aren't forest but scrub or desert. The JNF and the government are fond of planting eucalyptus or pine monocultures in those areas. Nothing much grows under those trees, and the groves are very quiet. This is called environmentalism. 

Empty house near Nahal Jilabun. There was a town here, once.

After two kilometers or so I turned onto the path to Nahal Jilabun (or Gilbon or Jalaboun or whatever you want to rename it). A thin trail with a Firing Zone Entrance is Forbidden sign in front of it led uphill towards a castle-like concrete ruin which had been spray-painted "The Golan is ours forever". I stayed on the road, which was choked with school buses. Apparently this place wasn't empty. 

A path led towards a ruined town, passing the ghosts of concrete houses. They've been empty for decades. Now they're covered in spray-painted prohibitions, graffiti, and other things I can't identify. I followed the stream downhill. Actually, I followed the trail which follows the stream, which is interesting work because the stream - and it really is a stream, year-round, deep (in places) - has two high waterfalls. 

the Jilabun waterfall

I kept walking through the riverbed thickets of oleander, cyclamen, reeds, and yeshiva students, who were heading out. I'd come in late; the canyon was shadowed, the cliffs were red. The trail climbed from the canyon up to a rocky hill and headed towards the Hula Valley. Other hills, blue in the dusk, lay next to the valley up to the Hermon foothills. I heard voices below me, froze, realized that they were at least a kilometer away, walked down to an intersection. A few wild boar crossed it, then I did. 

The trail was clearly enough marked - it was the stream. I slipped along as best I could in the dark. After a splash hike or two and a very dark reed tunnel, I camped in the first place I could. The stars were bright.

I started walking before dawn. Moonlight is useful. At sunrise I crossed a bridge over the Jordan. A little after that the cranes showed up, just a few striding on the wet green fields, then more flying, until the valley became a shriller, foggier version of a football stadium. I walked into the Hula reserve. More cranes. Flying, eating, standing by the thousands on the rich black soil. Two photographers lay in a field in front of a crane flock, moving carefully, softly, silently. I copied them, 

The cranes

keeping behind them so that if the cranes flew away it wouldn't be my fault. But this was a public area. People copied me. Mostly carefully. One couple walked carelessly and talked loudly. Some cranes flew away. The photographers either had what they came for or gave up, and left. So did I. 

Crane flying

I cut across the fields towards the Golan again, where I found more of the most dangerous and inconvenient animals in Israel. I had to walk at a cow's pace since a) they were in front of me and b) they aren't fast. They aren't friendly. They aren't easy to get around. For most of that night I though they'd try to eat my pack.

The next day, thanks to a strange firing zone/trail network, I hiked down to a road, up along a stream, down to another road, and up into the slope above the Hula Valley. There was no water and little shade but it was November and there were patches of bright green new grass, and even a little fading yellow and red on the trees. Mt. Hermon grew larger, and the sky was blue except for a long hazy cloud on the western horizon.

In the far north at the end of the Hula Valley the valley rises and the hills in the east go down to it. I was in the hills. I could west across the valley to Qiryat Shmona where there were buses (and camp where? in somebody's field?) or hike east into the upper Golan (and come back how? it's a day's walk from Banias to Qiryat Shmona and no buses that actually 

the olive groves near 'Ein Kiniya

come!) I saw trees on the mountainsides where I could hang a hammock instead of sleeping in the mud. I walked east. There are trees in the valley too, but I walked east. Uphill. Fast, because although it had felt like 2 pm for at least three hours the sun was definitely lower now, and the long hazy cloud blowing in. Somewhere above a wadi and below the olive groves near 'Ein Kiniya (because everyone knows all about 'Ein Kiniya) I stretched a hammock between the fallen branches of a great heavy-limbed oak in the flickering dusk.

Which kept flickering; it was a lightning storm. A grand old massive slow-moving storm, the kind everyone wants closing in on them at nightfall. I went to sleep.

Cyclamen in the morning

The rain started at 2 AM and gradually soaked everything. I got up at what should have been dawn, colder than ever history has recorded, took half an hour stuffing a saturated sleeping bag into my pack, and tried to walk out through the mud which clung to my soles.

Almond ripening in a winter orchard

I crossed the road, tried to shake the mud off my sandals, checked the map, and walked down the road. Almond and olive orchards lay on the hills down towards the misty valley.  The mud stuck to my sandals and crusted my pants and I had to walk at least ten miles before noon if I wanted to get home. It was a beautiful winter morning, cool and wet, green and brown and gray.

I turned off the Banias road onto a trail to the valley. Cows glared at me from behind a fence where someone rode a small-but-tough horse, wore an absurdly stereotypical hat...and took notes on a white pad.

"Where are you walking to?"
"Qiryat Shmona." I'd said that every time, even when I was going precisely the wrong way. I had far less time than he did, and walked past his horse. Fog swept in, shrunk the world to an empty hilltop for a few minutes, then lifted. I walked down past minefields and a sign commemorating something captured in the Six-Day War. Whatever once was there, there aren't two stones stacked together now. 

"Bahriyat. Conquered by the Golani Brigade. 9-6-67"

I followed the Hermon River (a real river, more or less, with autumn leaves and blackberries...but no time) across the valley and crossed a bridge. For those who believe in the power of positive thinking to reduce distances, Qiryat Shmona was just at the far end of the road. For those who check maps, it was all the way across the valley. I believe in the power of positive thinking to reduce distances, but I did check a hand-drawn map whose ink had run, so it was five kilometers but I made good time. I'd had enough walking for a little while.