I have been to.... Jerusalem

 Right, next stop Jerusalem. Well actually Ashdod, the rather nondescript port of Jerusalem. Although this was also a heavily guarded dockyard, at least there was a shuttle bus. Before then, we had another very long day as we motored off to Jerusalem.

The drive was absolutely fascinating, particularly the memorial to the convoys trying the relieve the Siege of Jerusalem (sadly we couldn't stop as it was by the motorway). I had never realised the city was up in the hills. It was several degrees cooler and also quite damp on the way up.

The rain cleared by the time we got there and we got a magnificent view of East Jerusalem and the old city. That is the Golden Dome in the distance.

Mount of Olives.

West Jerusalem.

Ancient burial caves with a nearby laying out slab.

The huge Jewish cemetery outside the Old City.

The old temple. The one with ejected moneylenders etc.

The Wailing Wall with the Golden Dome just beyond it.

I loved the labyrinth of streets in the old city. It reminded me of old Moorish cities in North Africa and southern Spain, which is hardly surprising.

We followed the Stations of the Cross along the Via Dolorosa. It was a tad touristy in places.

Jesus' hand print (or at least the recess where he reputedly rested his hand on the wall). It was de rigeur to place ones hand inside it.

More of the old city.

Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

Which was pretty busy but absolutely stunning inside. This is the queue to see Golgotha (which is enclosed in glass and you can actually see very well without joining this queue by just standing behind the rope barrier).

The slab Jesus was laid out on. Something to lay your hand on.

A beautiful Byzantine fresco of Jesus being laid to rest in his burial cave. 

The roof of the chapel above the Holy Sepulchre. It reminds me of the Pantheon in Rome.

The queue waiting to get into the burial cave itself. 

King Davids Castle (!)

And some of the better preserved walls around the Old City.

Bethlehem next stop. It has an amazing view across the Jordan valley.

Bethlehem is in the Palestinian Authority and had a very different feel to Jerusalem.

The Church of the Nativity. This is a large complex of buildings.

The main church has remnants of lots of Byzantine frescos. 

Fragments of surviving mosaics.

There is a Roman Catholic church next door reached via these delightful cloisters.

It was a very calm and tranquil space. Hilariously you could get down the nativity cave from here with no queue at all (the queue in the Orthodox church was vast).

St George, who hailed from these parts. Unfortunately there was some glare on the glass screen.

Sunset over Bethlehem. There was something of a gun battle a few hundred yards north of us at this point, bursts of automatic and semi automatic fire. The guards on the border crossing at the wall were somewhat jumpy when we went back but we got into Jerusalem OK.

And sunset over Ashdod. It was another long day, so next day we just got the shuttle bus into Ashdod. It is an unmarkable modern port city, but the free Wi Fi was most welcome!

Rather like the museum in Cairo, that was a bit more awe inspiring than I expected. One slightly jarring thing was seeing groups of school kids carrying assault rifles, but I guess it is a country in a permanent state of war.

So, that was an interesting couple of days. Where to next?