Day 6: Capernaum, Boat Ride

So we left our amazing cabins in the Golan Heights and set off for a closer look at the Sea of Galilee the town of Capernaum. Capernaum, if you remember, was the headquarters of Jesus and the disciples during His earthly ministry.

Capernaum is also the place where Jesus healed Peter's mother-in-law...Shlomi said, "Maybe that is the reason Peter denied Jesus 3 times..." (pause for chuckle!) So they built a church on top of the place believed to be Peter's mother-in-law's house, which also was one of the first home churches for Christians.

We also saw the synagogue where Jesus would go to teach, it's a synagogue that was built after Jesus' time, but the foundation is the same.

This also is the place where Jesus fed the 5000, so the church has a mosaic with 2 fish and...count them...4 loaves...but wait, weren't there 5 loaves in the story? Well, it is believed that Jesus is the 5th loaf as He is the Bread of Life.

Some interesting things, notice the sign going in to this complex...No dogs, no smoking, wear appropriate clothes and...no guns...check 'em at the door! Also, we've found no better two letters to see together, especially when nature calls, than the letters W and C!

I didn't notice this on my first trip to Israel 18 years ago, but there are cats everywhere!!! It doesn't matter where we go, there are stray cats...not sure about the significance of this, but just interesting!

Another beautiful thing was as we were walking around another group of perhaps 50 people was there, and they began to sing "How Great Thou Art"...really was a cool experience...

Then we were off to take a boat ride on the Sea of Galilee...as we were waiting for the time for the boat ride, we got to explore a museum where they recently discovered a fishing boat that is 2000 years old that had been buried along the shore of the Sea of Galilee...

It was an amazing discovery, but even more amazing was the engineering it took to excavate it out of the ground...you can imagine the shape of 2000 year old wood, but they covered it in Polyurethane foam and were able to raise it and even float it out of where it had been for 2000 years...really cool stuff!

We then set off on the good ship "Faith" as we went for a boat ride on the Sea of Galilee. The crew raised an American flag and as they did, we all sang our national anthem. Then when we were out in the middle of the lake, I read the story of Jesus calming the storm after he was awakened by the disciples. The lake was very calm on our particular day, so it gave a sense of what it may have felt like for the disciples after Jesus calmed the waves...

One of the crew members also showed us how the fishermen would cast their nets into the water to catch fish. The nets were weighted and would sink to the bottom, catching anything in their path on the way down. Then they would pull the net up with a rope and the net would close and the fish would get caught in the net...we didn't catch anything this day...even when he threw the net on the other side of the boat!:)

Here's Jeff doing his best Titanic impersonation!

Really was a fun experience to be on the Sea of Galilee!!! But now we're on to lunch!