Shabbat, 26 November 2016

I got up fairly early this morning but didn't go out for a walk because it was still pretty chilly out.

I started a load of laundry before breakfast. When it was done, I hung it out to dry on the racks in the hallway, and then I set out on a long morning walk. Now that the weather has cooled considerably, I can walk even in the middle of the day in the sun without overheating. I wore socks and shoes, short pants, and a t-shirt. I still got into the shade, though, when I could.

I walked down Argaman until just past the 60+ center, and then I cut over one short block, eventually coming out on Khativat HaNegev. Along that route, I captured today's pic of the day, a couple of really nice flowers high up in the sunlight:

I continued walking on Khativat HaNegev over into the Rova 6 area of the Shakhamon neighborhood (Shakhamon, as a whole, accounts for probably 1/3 to 1/2 of the entire city of Eilat, I think). Then I wandered around a bit in Rova 6. This is an area that is mostly not built yet, although the streets and most of the lots are pretty well laid out. A few buildings, especially apartment buildings, were completed before I moved to Eilat, and some houses have recently been completed, but there are LOTS of houses currently under construction, most of them unique designs and quite impressive.

I found one small group of tract houses near the center of Rova 6 (all being built on the same plan), and I walked into one of them that was partly done and had a look around. I thought it was very nice -- 4 bedrooms (one downstairs), an attached garage, a beautiful 2-story-high living room, a spacious upstairs balcony off the master suite, and a small, irregular L-shaped swimming pool. Here's a link to the page where the real estate agency is selling them. Exploring this house was the first major serendipity of this walk, but not the last.

I continued wandering around the area and eventually walked up the road at the south end, along the side of Nakhal Garuf. They've begun developing some sort of a strip park or promenade up there next to the road -- it's not clear exactly what it will be, but I'm sure it will be nice.

At the west end, the road goes down to connect with other roads, but I followed a somewhat precarious trail up the rocky hill there all the way to the peak. The views from up there are GREAT and would be even better on a day without haze. Today, however, I could barely see Aqaba (although yesterday would have been worse -- we couldn't see the Jordanian mountains at all!). Of course, I took quite a few pictures (check them out on Facebook if you're interested). Making it up this peak, which I hadn't really planned, was the 2nd serendipity of the day (and still not the last!).

The trail down the west side of the hill was steeper and rougher, but much shorter since it didn't have to go down nearly as far. I took it carefully, though, and had no mishaps. This got me to a large flat area that had obviously been leveled when they built the nearby apartments. Since this area is at the same level as about the 3rd or 4th floor of the apartment building, a couple of apartments at that end have large gardens with gates out to the open area.

In order to continue downward, I had to go around a construction site where they're building a new fire station at the very end of Sheshet HaYamim. From there, I could start up the Nakhal Garuf Promenade, where I encountered the 3rd serendipity: hundreds of beautiful butterflies flitting around everywhere! Of course, I snapped LOTS of pictures, some of which I later discarded because they weren't very good.

I didn't go all the way up the promenade this time. Instead, I took a short-cut up Ya'akov Avinu Street to Harim Road, on which I started heading back home. I stopped several times along the way, though, to crop photos, to rest, and to photograph yet another butterfly, near the Shakhamon high-rises, who stayed put much longer, allowing me to get closer, and was also well-positioned, with some delicate purple flowers nearby and a dark background behind. That was the 4th serendipity of the day. Here's one of my pics of this one:

After I got home and rested a while, I fixed lunch: a salad and eggs and rice, my usual for Shabbat.

In the afternoon, I mostly relaxed and even dozed a little. I also talked for more than an hour with David's sister, Joyce, and her husband, in Ohio.

I walked a total of 8.6 kilometers today.