My Second Day.....

Day two in the Old City (okay, technically this was Sunday, but I was a tad busy) was pretty sweet as well. I started off the day by trying to head to the Western Wall, aka the Wailing Wall, which is the last remaining wall from the Second Great Temple of Jerusalem and is the most sacred site for the Jewish people.
As I walked in that general directions, I took the long way around the wall and around the Armenian Quarter, which is pretty empty. I then stumbled upon a sweet archaeological park in the corner of the city, next to the wall. It was fantastic and I'm surprised that it wasn't that busy. It has remains from Palaces built in the 7th and 8th Centuries, as well as some remains from basic houses at the time. The park gives you a basic history of the city and area through the years, so if you're over here, it's worth the stop.
And then decided that I was going to try and get into the wall, since it was nearby. I had been thwarted on two early attempts by the local police and the IDF (Israeli Defense Force) agents that patrol the city and the site. (Brief side note--Many IDF folks are just teenagers serving their time in the military, so imagine if you will 17 yr old high school students, guys and gals, with automatic weapons and really big guns--good call).
This time, Success!!

I managed to get through security and I was able to say a brief prayer at the wall. Next I wandered into a little room to the left of it where many people were praying, because I thought this was the Wall Tunnels.....but no, it was a bunch of men praying. I was stopped at the entrance and asked if I was Jewish....upon replying no and asking if that was a problem, the man said, "No, no problem at all, you just need to smile as you walk through."

So I walked around as these men prayed and then I left that area and found the tunnels. The tunnels were pretty interesting. I bought my ticket at 1:30, but was told that I should have been on the 1:20 group, so I hurried through and looked for the English speaking group around the corner....or at least these were my directions.
Upon not finding the group, I decided that I could wander around the tunnels solo, which looked a bit shady no doubt, but it was still fun. You got to see a lot of the wall, so arches and some pretty cool cisterns. Good times.

After this I made my way back to the hostel for a brief rest and falafel (awesome) and then I took a taxi to check out Jerusalem's best shopping area....the Jerusalem mall.

It sucked. Totally not worth the money....but they had a Burger King and you bet I ate there, since we don't have it in Egypt.

Then I came back to the hostel, walked to the bus station to check out bus rides to Eilat for Tuesday and returned to the hostel where we dissected US Marshals, a fabulous movie, for the remainder of the evening.