(Rhoda) In the last day of our Dead Sea trip,
we decided to get in the car
and explore the south of the Dead Sea region.
♪ (music) ♪
No matter where you turn here,
you'll find something of biblical and historical significance.
(Sergio) There's just endless routes
and paths and little roads into the mountains
and monuments and structures in the mountains.
Pool reservations.
New pools that are formed because of the Dead Sea drying out.
It's incredible. There's so much to do here.
This is so cool.
Wow!
(Rhoda) In this episode,
we'll explore the valley of the Zohar brook,
which is mentioned in the Bible as the way of Edom.
And we'll explore the ancient Roman fortress
that stands on top of a marlstone hill.
(Sergio) We're in a very interesting location.
In the middle of this valley,
surrounded by just limestone and rock,
is a fortress.
(Rhoda) Then, we'll continue south to Mt. Sodom,
which has a peculiar-looking pillar
named after Lot's wife.
That's Lot's wife?
And underneath it a cave
which some believe to be the place
where Lot dwelt with his daughters.
So join us on an adventure
in this marvelous and unique place on Earth.
♪ (music) ♪
(footsteps crunching)
♪ (music) ♪
(Sergio) In the south of the Dead Sea,
there is a place called Zohar brook.
It is not to be confused with Zoar,
the place to which Lot escaped from Sodom and Gomorrah.
Even though these two sound similar in English,
in Hebrew language, they're entirely different words.
The entrance to this valley is somewhat hard to spot.
It's a little turn from the main road 90,
which takes you on a dirt road.
And then a few yards later,
it leads you to a scenic drive by the edge of a cliff
in between beautiful limestone and marlstone mountains.
This road is believed to be the way of Edom,
mentioned in II Kings 3,
when the king of Israel, Judah, and Edom
went to fight the Moabites.
And to get to Moab, they took this way.
But after seven days, they ran out of water.
And after Elijah's prayer,
God provided an abundance of water to this valley
even though there was no rain.
So scholars believe that this location
fits the biblical story
because it rains a far off in the mountains
so you cannot hear the rain.
But, then, the rain water does not get absorbed into the ground
but rather drains down the mountains into this valley
filling the cisterns and the water dams
that they excavated here.
♪ (music) ♪
A few years back, archaeologists started digging and looking into
the history behind this place.
What they were surprised to find,
there is very little information left
behind who lived here,
who were the people,
why this fortress was built,
and what was this road.
So a few different theories started to be developed.
One of them is that this fortress is built
in a very strategical place in the center of the Edom way.
This way is believed to later become
the trade route during the Roman-Byzantine
or the Crusader-Mamluk periods
to carry the salt produced in the Dead Sea
into the heart of the land.
And historians speculate
that this fortress served to protect the road
and perhaps even collect taxes on the salt trade.
There is even a lookout tower,
carved out of the bedrock,
located in front of the fortress.
It would be a great place
for soldiers to observe the incoming traffic.
But all these are theories
which have not much archaeological support.
The first survey dated this fortress to the Roman time,
while a later conducted survey
placed it into the Crusader period.
The lack of archaeological evidence to build a proper storyline
can be attributed to the easily crumbling marlstone.
Look at this.
What looks like once used to be steps
is now... Look at this.
It all looks like just one...
slide.
It crumbles so easily.
You don't want to attempt to climb this.
♪ (music) ♪
(car blinker clicking)
(Rhoda) Eshet Lot.
Lot's wife.
Mitzpe.
Look. Look. Wow! Look at that.
Look at that rock.
♪ (music) ♪
(Rhoda) There are two pillars for Lot's wife:
one in Jordan and one in Israel.
The Jordanian pillar
has a much better shape of a human
and an interesting cave with archaeological findings
from the Iron Age,
while the Israeli pillar looks more like giant rock
with a salt cave underneath.
It would make no sense to figure out
which one is the real pillar...
because, according to the Book of Genesis,
the pillar shouldn't even be above the cave at all
but rather in the plain.
That's Lot's wife?
So what we see here today is just a reminder of the story
rather than an artifact.
(Sergio) I don't know.
It looks like Lot's wife was...
Maybe a relative of the Nephilim.
Nephilim or Goliath
or the Anakim or...
I don't know.
But the interesting part about this place
is the actual mountain rather than the pillar itself.
This mountain is called Mt. Sodom.
And if you examine it with your eyes,
you'll notice that there are no plants or vegetation on it.
That is because Mt. Sodom is made of 80% salt.
It is one giant mountain of salt.
And since salt dissolves much faster than limestone,
this mountain is home to the longest, single,
natural salt cave in the world.
It is nearly 2.5 miles long.
And, until recently, it was open to the public.
But today, it had been closed
due to the danger of falling salt rocks.
The cave of Lot and his daughters,
where they hid after they left Zoar.
Zoar is south of the Dead Sea, and it says,
from there they left and went to dwell in the caves,
so it's very much possible they dwelt in caves like these over here.
(Rhoda) You know, when we read about it,
and you read that they went up to the mountains
and in a cave there...
in my head, mountains are those green, big,
where you have a lot of trees and everything.
- Yeah. - But the mountains in this area,
they're just sand, desert.
They're bare. There's nothing on them.
Yeah.
So, I never thought about it like that.
And it must've not been easy,
especially in the heat and all that.
But there are plenty of caves in those mountains.
I mean, plenty.
- It's amazing. - It's amazing.
Yeah, and there are some sources of water.
You've got to know where they are,
but if you don't, you'll die out here
because that sea is so salty, you can't drink it.
- (Rhoda) No, there's no way. - (Sergio) You can do nothing with it.
So to get fresh water,
you've got to know where those reservoirs are,
where the streams are,
otherwise you'd die in here.
Yeah.
(Sergio) This is nice.
A little bit of shade.
You know, after swimming in the Dead Sea,
like the oily, oily part,
because its oily and salty and everything,
and then you stand in the sun,
and it feels like somebody is frying you.
Deep fried.
And you don't need seasoning because we have salt.
Wow.