♪ (music) ♪
(Sergio) Beautiful. Wow.
I can't believe we're here again.
Dead Sea 2.0. Here we go.
Wee-haw!
(Rhoda) This time, we are in Ein Bokek,
the resort district by the Dead Sea.
It is home to the main beach of the Dead Sea in Israel,
and it happens to be, in our opinion,
the most beautiful one of all of them.
(Sergio) I think we should go up there.
(Rhoda) But more than that, just across the road
is a beautiful hiking path
along the natural springs and ancient ruins.
♪
(Rhoda) So join us this episode
as we explore this wonderful place
on the shores of the Dead Sea.
Romeo. Romeo.
Romeo.
(gobble call)
♪ (music) ♪
♪ (Bamtone, “Everyday”) ♪
♪
(Rhoda) Ein Bokek is a famous resort district.
It is the lowest resort in the world
with 17 beautiful hotels.
Tourists come from all over
to enjoy a good time on the free public beach,
sip on a cold drink, and bathe in the Dead Sea.
(Sergio) Wow. That was absolutely fantastic.
It's like oil on your skin.
It's so cool.
- Hello. - Hello.
It's a stone full of salt
all around it.
Man, you gotta come and try this.
This is absolutely incredible.
Now, if you can't make it here,
what you can do is take lots of salt,
fill it up in your bathtub and try it at home.
I don't know how much salt you would need,
but probably a lot.
Our viewers, especially the ones from Superior Word from Florida,
might be asking:
"But Sergio and Rhoda, we also have
the white beaches, the white sand,
and the turquoise water.
So, we have it."
And true, they do, and it's beautiful.
But, whenever you swim in Florida,
you think about a few things:
shark bites, stingrays,
things crawling up on you or swimming up on you.
Here, everything is dead.
You don't think about that at all.
Dead.
Everything is dead except humans.
- Yeah. - (growling)
Oh my goodness.
That's evil.
Oh. Your neck is really salty.
- (Rhoda) Ew, gross.
Oh, wow!
The salt concentration here is insane.
Wow! Oh, it's so salty, it's bitter.
My tongue is confused from the salt level.
It thinks it's bitter.
I can't believe you did that.
Beside the hotels and the beaches,
this place has the lowest mall in the world
with a couple of fast-food restaurants,
a few souvenir shops,
and a convenience store.
And even though this district looks very modern,
it rests upon 4th century Roman Byzantine ruins.
This is an early Roman farmhouse.
This is where they grew the balsam plants
to be used for perfumes and oils.
Today, it is part of the public park
and open for anyone to enjoy it.
Behind me is the reason why it is wise to charge
an entrance fee to the national parks
at historic sites in Israel.
♪
(Rhoda) The ruins extend outside of the district,
across the main road,
where you can take a hike
starting at the Roman aqueduct and water storage chambers.
This place offers a couple of hike routes.
The first route is to go alongside the spring,
between the mountains, on an easy path,
under the shadow of the trees.
(Sergio) So, it means, where we are standing right now
is where rushing water would go
in season or after it rains.
Mm-hmm.
So, it means, if it rains somewhere up in the mountains
and we didn't know about it,
then, any second right now,
gushing water will come here,
rush down, and just sweep us away
and take us into the Dead Sea.
That's definitely not gonna happen.
Well, I shouldn't say definitely.
Or, we have the second route
which takes you on a steep mountain incline,
with crumbling rocks, under the scorching sun.
So, after considering our options,
for obvious and most logical reasons,
just like all normal and sane people,
we chose the steep incline.
This hike is not for the faint-hearted,
I'll tell you that much... which is me.
♪
If you guys are in a desert situation like this,
every time you put your foot onto something,
you've got to inspect that it's solid and doesn't crumble.
♪ (music) ♪
So, first, let's say, right here,
I'm gonna hold this.
You see, it's not solid, so I'm gonna find a solid spot.
Test it first before you put all your weight on it.
See, I put my foot. I'm testing it.
Is it solid? Yeah.
Now I can go there.
Now this.
That was a tough hike.
And now what is it time for?
A cool-down.
Whoo.
Is it solid? Yes.
And it's not slippery. Good.
And I'm already thinking of the next step.
I'll probably put my foot right here.
There are some rocks here.
They're sharp, so they're gonna hold my foot.
It smells a little bit like...
urine.
Just a little bit.
There you go.
It's not that hard.
Just make sure you always test the ground
before you actually put all your weight on it
because something could crumble down.
Why did I get up here?
How am I gonna come down?
My wife will inspire me.
I need to get to her.
Look what I found.
Aww.
Try not to sit on rocks like these.
They look giant,
but there was a time when I actually fell down
and almost broke my foot.
It looks huge, but they're sometimes unstable
due to earthquakes, Earth movements.
Wait. Are you saying my heart is made out of rock?
I don't think I thought that one through.
You don't want to lean on something that looks unstable.
Even if it looks stable, always test it.
Don't assume that it's solid enough
to support your weight.
Always test it with a little bit of weight
in such a way that if it falls down, crumbles down,
you are safe.
And that concludes the instructional video
on how to climb the Judean desert mountains.
(Rhoda) At the time when we made this hike,
we knew very little about the ruins
that are on top of this mountain.
This looks like the other one we saw at Zohar.
Very similar.
After a little research,
we found out that it is a fortress
originally built in the 4th century by Saint Augustine
during the Roman Byzantine time.
♪ (music) ♪
The purpose of this fortress
was to guard the coastal area,
the Judea routes,
and the Roman perfume and medicine factory
that operated here.
(Sergio) This fortress was excavated in 1968
by no other than the late professor, Mordechai Gichon,
a Russian Jew who was born in Germany
and escaped the Nazis by immigrating to Eretz Israel
in 1934.
Mordechai Gichon did not waste any time,
as shortly after his arrival,
he went to study archaeology in the University of Jerusalem.
In the '60s, he founded the archaeology department
in Tel Aviv University where he became a professor.
And later in life, he taught in the Oxford University
and was one of the authors
of the Dead Sea Scrolls Encyclopedia.
But if all this is not enough,
he also happens to be one of the founders
of the Israeli Field Intelligence Force
and the Supreme Intelligence School.
Whoa. Look at this!
These door sizes are not big enough for you.
(Sergio) There's this patch of green in the mountain.
There could be some water source there.
Let's climb up there and inspect.
Let's go to the palm tree.
Maybe we can find some water
that would be nice to dive in.
I see, over there, like sand.
And I hear something.
Do you hear it?
I'm going this way.
Be careful. Don't! Don't!
The ground is hollow underneath you.
(Sergio) Whoa, yeah.
Yeah, don't go there.
I think this is fresh water that was there,
and the ground started cracking right under my feet.
You see how hollow it is?
That could be very dangerous. Very dangerous.
We better go where the rocks are.
You know, it's also possible
there is a water stream under the ground
but not too deep.
That would explain this palm tree
and these green bushes
in the middle of this desert place.
That means that if there is water streaming under there
and not too deep down,
there is a tunnel,
and the top layer dried up
making it look like soil.
But once you step on it, you can fall through,
Let's not go there.
♪ (music) ♪
We hope you enjoyed this episode...
...as much as we enjoyed this hike.
See you till next time.
I think they enjoyed the episode more than we enjoyed the hike.
- You think so? - I think so.
- It was a steep climb. - It was a steep climb.
It's crazy hot, and it's not even 9:00 in the morning.
It's hotter than 14 Fahrenheit, actually.
Oh, some breeze. Thank you, Lord.