Golan Heights: Day two

We started the next morning with a quick trip to Kfar Haruv, a kibbutz where my mom spent six months working and learning Hebrew in her twenties. A kibbutz is a type of communal farm where locals live together sharing the responsibilities of work, child care, cooking, cleaning etc. It use to be a very popular destination for North Americans (perhaps other countries too) to spend six months or more on a work and learn type vacation. Unfortunately, Kibbutz’ are becoming less popular and are not accepting so many outsiders as the economy has changed and people are less likely to want to work for the communal and better good. Interestingly enough my parents met on a different kibbutz in their twenties and lived together before traveling to Egypt and Amsterdam before returning home. The Kfar Haruv kibbutz was very beautiful and set among trees overlooking the Sea of Galilee.

We left the kibbutz for breakfast at a local tourist spot called Aniyam. We shared a couple of Israeli breakfasts and could hardly finish all of the bread and spreads. Amazing cheeses, jams and dips, we ate and ate. Once we finished breakfast we began to explore the adorable village filled with brightly colored art shops selling various items. Ariana saw a sign for a fish pedicure above one of the shops and we set out to explore. It is the new “in” pedicure to have these tiny Garra Rufa fish (from Turkey) affectionately known as “doctor fish” nibble on the dead skin of its eager recipients.

Our twenty minute treatment was relaxing and refreshing although a bit unnerving when you first dip your feet into the water and the fish begin to work. It was a really great experience and something I would highly recommend trying. Certain states and now England are looking into the potential health risks that might be associated, but this kind of treatment has been used for thousands of years in Asia with no reported health problems not to mention the tank is filtered about every four minutes to ensure the water is clean.

With our smooth new feet we traipsed through the art village buying handmade items for our homes. We left mid-morning and made a few stops along the way including beautiful waterfalls just off the main road. We also stopped and took pictures with a couple of deserted tanks. Joe was all in there, literally getting inside and moving the gun around. He was in heaven! We also stopped and looked through an old Syrian bunker left over from the war. We finished off our trip to the Golan by visiting some family nearby before making the two hour drive back to the shomron.