Israel Trip: December-January 2014-2015
The next morning, Thursday, we took a cab to the old town of Jaffa, just to the south, and stopped for breakfast at Abulafia, a famous bakery with a mushroom-egg pizza for Marcus, more bourekas for us, and some pretzel- and bagel-like things for Samantha.
Happy new year! The decorations on the cheeses and creams made us realize it was indeed January 1st. Robert said he'd heard fireworks last night, but all around us was a great deal of activity for 9:00 in the morning on the 1st--clearly Silvester (as it's called here) is just another work day for the vast majority of people.
Around the corner was Wheelbee, a bike shop where we rented a basic bike for me and a bike for Robert with a seat for Samantha on the front and a trailabike for Marcus on the back, plus locks and helmets for us all. We initially got the bikes only for one day, but then decided to keep them longer so we would have some way of getting around the city easily on Shabbat. I was unsteady on the bike at first, without my friend Sara from Seattle to guide me, but by the afternoon of the second day I was riding with confidence.
We rode over to the sea wall and then up the beach bike path, and basically spent all of Thursday riding from playground to playground, hitting all the ones on the beach and then up near the port.
We stopped for the business lunch/breakfast for two at Nimrod's Cafe on the water and had a lovely meal midday, then rode back to the apartment just before sunset to lock up the bikes (we had to be creative, attaching them to the bars surrounding a ground-floor AC unit on the side of the building), as I was cautious about riding at night.
For dinner we walked to Tipico at the top of Nachalat Benyamin for rotisserie chicken, fried potato wedges, and fried rice. The owner was extremely friendly, bringing the kids each a little top and a whistle and a tiny board game, and bringing us four fresh sodas made from his house-made syrups in different fruit flavors. Everyone ate with gusto, and we brought back a bit of leftovers to the apartment.
On Friday we went to the Carmel Shuk (market) and wandered around eating delicious things. There was a kosher dim sum stand with sweet and sour chicken dumplings and goose dumplings, both of which were great, if a little pricy. We also got a crepe of some kind spread with labna (I think) and salad, which was nice; a deep-fried rolled-up mushroom in batter thing (really, it looked like a corn dog with mushrooms inside instead of a hot dog); some more bourekas and donuts from a bakery; a mix of freshly-squeezed pomegranate and orange juice (so delicious--both kids loved this and drank it from two straws at the same time, though we missed the cutest photo); Turkish delight; dried strawberries and dried coconut and dates; very cheap fresh strawberries and clementines; and some halvah, both milk chocolate and oreo. (We later went back and got the coffee halvah for Robert, who desperately wanted it but was being all virtuous at first.)
Then we went back to the apartment (with one quick playground stop) to stash our loot and meet up with Nur, our assigned Tel Aviv Greeter.
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Created: 1/11/15. Last Modified: 1/11/15.