Israel - Haifa

The train trip from Tel Aviv to Haifa went smoothly. A soldier was sitting next to me with his rifle. Interesting experience. I like how all the girls in Israel need to do military service also. So funny to watch these small girls walking with their rifles which are same size as they. Also in the train I saw my first conservative Jew. He was giving away pamflets and wished good shabbat.
I arrived to Haifa's Hof HaCarmel station where I met my next host Jacob. He drove me to his amazing apartment. It was located on top of the mountain and you could see the whole city from there. I would like to have same kind of apartment one day. He made some delicious chicken and then we went to the movies - my first time outside of Finland! We decided to see the film Due Date. In Israel the films are subtitled so it's easy to travellers also to go see films in theatres. The film was very funny and Israeli crowd was loud but in  a good way. After film we went back home and I went to sleep.

Next day was Saturday, the day of shabbat. But that didn't affect my plans. I was very lucky to get hosted by Jacob. Haifa is large city by area and it's located on mountain slope so walking wouldn't been option here. Luckily I had Jacob and his car. My plan in Haifa was to see Baha'i Gardens. But thanks to rain during the night the gardens were closed. Gardens are closed if it's been rainy because all the stairs become very slippery. But we drove to see gardens from German Colony. German Colony is this one street full of cute little stone houses made by Germans. The gardens are on the other end of the road where they rise magnificently on the slope of the mountain. Small area on the bottom of the gardens was open where I experienced the slipperity of the stairs. Big shame that it was closed because weather now was perfect. Then we drove to see the cable car. The cable car is located on Bat Galim beach where you can get on top of the Mount Carmel. The cable cars were ball-shaped and very funny looking. On top of the Mount Carmel we saw Stella Maris Carmelite Monastery and then we went eat at the Arab restaurant. There I had my first experience of Israeli appetizers. Tabel full of different vegetables, olives, pita bread and hummus. Delicious! I was so full that I really didn't need the main course anymore but it was delicious too. The restaurant was full of families celebrating shabbat.
After dinner we went back down and drove to Dado Beach. There we watched the sunset. It was über-romantic setting, too bad that we weren't lovers :D For the last thing we went to see Haifa's night lights from top of the Baha'i Gardens. Back home Jacob made delicious pizzas and we watched film Gran Torino. And after that it was time for good sleep because next day would be full of walking again.