Rosh Pina area Day 1: Drive north to Mitzpe Hayamim

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This was the second year of the COVID-19 corona virus pandemic and again our summer vacation options excluded travels abroad. (Although to be truthful, we took advantage of a temporary window of opportunity in June to visit our daughter in England after 16 months apart.) As we did last year we are enjoying more places in our own wonderful country - see our 2020 blog about the Kfar Blum area. Here we were spending 5 days in the northeast Galilee around Rosh Pina.

Our base for 4 nights was the Mitzpe Hayamim spa hotel. Normally the venues in Israel are heavily booked by foreign tourists while many Israelis fly elsewhere for their holidays. This year the local population are filling the properties, which is good to help resuscitate our tourism business. In fact it was challenging to find someplace. As members of the Isrotel hotel Sun Club we were alerted to rooms at special rates to fill openings in their hotels. We selected Mitzpe Hayamim for two reasons: 1- because of location and 2- because we had stayed there many years ago before Isrotel acquired and upgraded it.

The drive north began in the late morning and we did not encounter heavy traffic. The ride took about 2.5 hours. The reception was friendly and efficient and our room was ready. It was a deluxe room in one of the buildings separate from the main hotel. A porter gave us a ride in an electric cart and carried our bags into the room. Then he showed us that we were really much closer to the centre of action than the ride had seemed, pointing out the short walking paths directly from our door to the restaurant, lounge and pool areas.

We unpacked, settled in and immediately began to relax. Most important was simply taking a break from the daily routine, which was generally narrower during this pandemic than ‘normal’ times.

And the bugs started their biting. They concentrated on Lesley as usual, although Don wasn’t let off the hook.

At dinnertime we went to the buffet restaurant. This was a buffet of vegetarian, vegan and fish dishes, plus drinks and desserts. Mitzpe Hayamim maintains their own farm which provides many of the vegetables, herbs and salad ingredients. Tours of the farm are offered a couple of days each week, but we would rather eat than look. We were satisfied with enough choices, and knew we would be returning the next night to see what new dishes appeared. Our hotel booking was 2 nights half-board with dinner and breakfast, and 2 nights bed and breakfast only.

After dinner we read a little and looked out from the balcony to see lights all across the valley below and the surrounding hills. Then we went to sleep.



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