f&nbparap;you’re looking for a pleasant yet challenging varied day walk, try this Jerusalem-area hike. It follows the Israel Trail for most of the way, giving the novice walker a true taste of what the trail has to offer.
The trek starts at the Sataf cafe, and it follows the well manicured orange, blue and white-marked path that takes you past ruined Arab mansions. It goes down to a 1,000-dunam (250 acre) fragment of traditional mountain- terraced cultivation, which was lovingly restored in the 1980s by the JNF. These farming plateaus (bursting with cabbages and fresh lettuce) are fed by two springs — the Bikura higher up and the Sataf lower down.
For the geologically minded, the Bikura and the Sataf are layer springs. They form where the water-filled permeable limestone meets the impervious yellow marl (clay and flint) rock strata. Weathering and erosion expose the top of the marl layers, at which point the water emerges from underground as a spring. These layer springs’ exits were artificially widened; their waters are collected in cisterns and directed through a system of channels to the levels of the crops that need them most.
Spend at least an hour here — very likely to the peal of the bells of the Monastery of St. John in the Desert further along the trail. Contortionists may explore the springs’ subterranean underground tunnels, and swimmers have a choice of two cisterns (which so far have not been segregated by sex) for bathing purposes.
Most of the terraces, however, have been neglected for decades, bringing to mind a passage from Isaiah: ’My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vinesÉ he built a watching place in the midst of it, and hewed a vineyard in itÉ he set it to produce grapes, but it brought forth sour polyps’ (5:1-2).
With this parable, the Prophet Isaiah castigated the inhabitants of Israel — the proverbial vineyard — for straying from their spiritual moorings. And you will know exactly what he meant as you take in the discarded farmland that has seen better days, and you cautiously nibble the sour fruit of the long-abandoned trees.
Next, the trail drops down quickly to the Sorek riverbed. Its faint but unmistakable biologically generated stench testifies to the Sorek’s function in conveying the capital’s wastes to the Mediterranean, some of which are detoxified in a modern plant a little lower down the valley.Next, the trail drops down quickly to the Sorek riverbed. Its faint but unmistakable biologically generated stench testifies to the Sorek’s function in conveying the capital’s wastes to the Mediterranean, some of which are detoxified in a modern plant a little lower down the valley.The air becomes cleaner as the trail turns right, dips under Route 386 and for the next hour makes an exhausting climb beyond the aforementioned monastery. You should pause at the remains of the hewn stone dam, most likely built in the early Arab period (640-1099 CE) to store the waters of the Handak Spring above. The nimble may explore the two dark tunnels chiseled in the wall.Just outside Even Sapir, the trail makes a sharp left and confronts you with the most precipitous clamber of the day, including three patience-demanding scrambles that the timid can avoid with short circuitous detours. It levels out, and in the last 20 minutes reaches the shaded recreational area of Hirbet Sa’adim — loosely translated as ’The Ruins of the Happy Woman.’ According to legend, the barren were rendered fruitful by the mystical interventions of one Sheikh Ahmed. This spot is ideal for a halfway lunch break.From here, the hike drops precipitously into the Refaim Valley. It will put even the firmest grips of quality walking shoes to the test. Actually, the route avoids the last plummet as it turns right and follows a wide downhill track along the northern side of the valley, whose eerie silences are broken every half-hour by the diesel-powered trains plying the single-track Jerusalem-Tel Aviv railway.
