Biblical Tels - Megiddo and Ridván Gardens

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Biblical Tels - Megiddo

   Megiddo is the hill that gave the world the word Armageddon, which comes from Har Megiddo, the mount of Megiddo, and it sits where the Jezreel valley opens to the coast road, a little north of the Wadi Ara pass. The tell is a long mound made of some twenty layers of ruined cities piled on top of each other, and from its top the whole green plain stretches north to the hills of Nazareth. Today it is inscribed on the World Heritage list together with two other biblical mounds.

   Read the complete Biblical Tels - Megiddo write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Biblical Tels - Megiddo is where the day begins. Next is Tel Hazor.

2. 2. Tel Hazor

   If you stand on the top of Tel Hazor on a clear day, the view is of the Hula valley to the north and the hills of Upper Galilee to the west, with the snow-capped hump of Mount Hermon, in winter, sitting at the far end. The tel itself is a vast, flat-topped mound, the largest ancient site in Israel's north, rising out of the fields near Kibbutz Ayelet HaShahar. It is what archaeologists call a tel, a hill made of the layers of cities built one on top of another over thousands of years.

   Read the complete Tel Hazor write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Tel Hazor comes up about 78 km into the recorded legs. Next is Ridván Gardens.

3. 3. Ridván Gardens

   In the spring of 1863, Bahá'u'lláh, the founder of the Bahá'í faith, spent twelve days in a garden in Baghdad that Bahá'ís now call Ridván, the Garden of Paradise, and the festival of that name still marks the most holy days in their calendar. The garden outside Acre that carries the same name is a different place, a quiet green island on the Na'amán river, east of the old city, which Bahá'u'lláh loved during his years as a prisoner and exile of the Ottomans in Acre. He called it the New Jerusalem, and visitors who enter its small gate understand why. The river runs around it, mulberry trees give shade, and the air is cool and smells of water.

   Read the complete Ridván Gardens write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 139 km into the recorded legs you reach Ridván Gardens. Next is back through Tel Hazor.

4. 4. back through Tel Hazor

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Tel Hazor write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Tel Hazor, late in the day. Next is Biblical Tels - Megiddo.

5. 5. Biblical Tels - Megiddo

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Biblical Tels - Megiddo write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Biblical Tels - Megiddo. That is the ride.