This will be a special Easter for me. I will be hiking the Jesus Trail. On Easter day I will be somewhere between Nazareth and the Sea of Galilee.
My friend and fellow Covenant Presbyterian elder Jeff Weill will be with me. Many readers remember when Jeff was on the Jackson City Council and serving as a Hinds County circuit judge for many years.
Jeff took me to Edo for lunch to sell me on the trip, which he had read about in the Wall Street Journal. It was a pretty day and I was in a good mood. No sooner had he started his pitch, then I said, “Ok. I’ll go.” He was shocked and said, “I didn’t think there was any chance at all you would say yes.”
One thing I have learned about life. It’s extremely hard to organize a trip like this. When somebody else is up for it, that’s the time to say yes and make it happen.
I’m 63 and nobody has ever asked me to do a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. The bus tour thing is not my deal. I knew that if I didn’t say yes, I would die without this experience. I’m hoping and praying I have a profound spiritual revelation. It’s happened many times before.
I call Jeff the Walking Man, a reference to the James Taylor song. The man just loves to walk and walk and walk. Being a man of deep faith, the Jesus Trail is the perfect blend of his faith and his hobby.
I can’t say I’m much of a walker, although I did walk our dogs pretty much every day until they passed away at ripe old ages last year. (Funny, I was the only one in the family not keen on having dogs, yet I was the one who ended up walking them every day.)
The Jesus Trail is, of course, thousands of years old but it has only recently been touted as a tourist destination with the motto, “Jesus didn’t take a bus, why should you.” Local promoters believed it would spur tourism and local economic development and it has.
When Jesus began his ministry he left Nazareth and went to the Sea of Galilee (really just a medium sized lake) where he recruited his disciples, many of whom fished the lake. There are numerous Christian and Jewish historical sports along the trail.
In April the weather will be just perfect, highs in the mid 70s and lows around 60. It’s the dry season so the chance of getting rained on is about one out of 10 for the duration of the trip.
You may think of the terrain as deserty, but it’s really Mediterranean and exquisitely beautiful with forests and hills. Some of the trail actually goes right through small towns and cities. There are group hostels along the way where you can sleep and eat at very affordable rates.
The flight over was quite a bargain, $1,100 round trip. This may end up being one of the most affordable vacations I’ve ever been on.
We fly into Helsinki, Finland, where we change planes and fly to Tel Aviv. We have an eight hour layover in Helsinki. We plan to drive into town, have lunch and wander around. A nice break in the monotony of long distance air travel.
Unfortunately, this flight path goes directly over Ukraine. (Maybe that’s why the flight was so cheap!) No doubt, our airplane will be diverted around that troubled airspace.
The Jesus Trail is 40 miles. We plan to do 10 miles a day. I think I can handle that. I recently walked my golf round at Patrick Farms. It was eight miles pushing a 35 pound golf cart and I had no problems.
I got special hiking boots at Buffalo Peak. They are the most comfortable things I’ve ever put around my feet.
This was a great example of the value of a knowledgeable local retailer. I didn’t want to waste a lot of time researching hiking footwear. I wanted to walk in, find somebody who knew hiking shoes, try them on and make a wise purchase. And that’s just how it went down. I later checked out the shoe on Amazon. It was highly rated and cost more than the store price.
Another good friend, Brooks Moseley, who just about everybody in northeast Jackson knows and loves, lent me his state-of-the-art backpack. Fully loaded, it weighs 15 pounds. I am going to start walking around my Loho neighborhood testing out my comfort and endurance. I hope I don’t end up with sudden onset back spasm. My scoliosis can do that.
After the hike we plan to visit Old Jerusalem which will be simultaneously celebrating Easter for the Christians, Passover for the Jews and Ramadan for the Muslims. It should be quite a spectacle. This overlap doesn’t happen often. There are fears of tension. There has been a recent uptick in terrorist attacks in Israel.
As I noted to Jeff, flying over Ukraine into Old Jerusalem in the middle of a rash of terrorist violence. What could possibly go wrong?
I’m not worried. Statistically speaking, it’s far safer than Jackson. And besides, dying on a Jesus Trail pilgrimage during Easter would be a pretty holy way to go. And what did Jesus say about worrying? Luke 12:25 “And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?”
People overreact to incidents of violence because they often don’t think statistically. The chances of being a victim in Israel of a terrorist attack is less than one in a million. If you start altering your behavior based on statistics that remote you’re going to have a very constrained life.
Despite the rapid decline of covid, all the testing requirements for travel are still in place. We have to wear a mask the whole flight. We have to get a PCR test 72 hours before our departure. Then when we get to Israel we have to take another PCR test and go directly to our hotel and stay there until the results come in. Fortunately, that shouldn’t be a problem since it will be 11 p.m. and we will be exhausted and want to go straight to bed.
I will be making daily posts to the Northside Sun’s “Friends” feed if you want to hike the trail with me using social media.
