On Shabbat, Saturday, I ventured to Old Yafo, Old Jaffa by the sea. This was the trade port on the Medittereanean for the Kingdom of Israel. It's also where Peter visited Simon the Tanner. I walked next to Tel Aviv's beach on the walk there. The beach was positively packed. There was barely room to fit another chair or blanket. They say this is a typical Shabbat in Tel Aviv! The people here seemed nothing like those in the other parts of Israel I'd seen. Everywhere were bare-chested men and ladies in bikinis, even on the sidewalks. I began to wonder if there were any conservative Jewish people at all in Tel Aviv!? Except for speaking Hebrew, everyone seemed culturally European-did I mention speedos- or American. It looked a lot like the beaches where I grew up in Long Island, and even less conservative. The lady at the service counter said the walk to Yafo takes about 30 minutes, in actuality it's almost an hour and a half. The beach in Tel Aviv is enormous.
Yafo is predominately Arabic and many Muslims live there. As I got closer to Yafo, I came to the last sandy stretch of beach before the rocky coastline that preceedes Old Yafo.
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