After a very late night, I opened my sludgy eye sockets and staggered downstairs. I overheard Alex, an American girl staying here, say she was off for a plodge through Hezekiah’s Tunnel at the City of David, part of the Jerusalem Walls National Park. We went with Fedi, one of the guys who works at the hostel.

Entry was 23 Shekels, which seemed a bit steep but I suppose archaeological works are expensive to maintain. It’s a very popular spot for tourists so expect queuing. A lot of it. The signs say that the walk takes 45 minutes and this includes waiting time. For our trip, that time was doubled.

The waterway was hewn out of the rock around 700BC and stretched for over half a kilometer. Apparently the section you can walk down is nearer 120m, though it seemed longer. It’s not very claustrophobic, though you will find the ceiling a little low at points, and your own torch is a necessity. The water doesn’t get much higher than “lower thigh” but it’s a good idea to make sure your footwear is up to it. And be prepared to get stuck in a line for ages as too many tourists stop to take pictures mid-tunnel. And kids will insist on screaming in the echoey chamber. And your eardrums will split.

Still, it was a cool thing to do even if it did slightly dent my thoughts of having kids, or becoming a teacher. Mind, I’d not have let them continue the way the schoolteacher behind us did. Sadly with the tunnel plodge taking so long we didn’t have much time to see the rest of the Park. Maybe next time.

Then the day got… weirder. Noa picked me up in the afternoon and dropped me off again on the outskirts of Tel Aviv. I located the right bus to get me onto the main road and wandered around the shops for a while before locating my hostel.

Tel Aviv to someone of my generation is another Israeli city hit by bombs and huge problems. The current day image is vastly different. It’s a bustling modern city with impressive tower blocks, a lovely beach and a buzzing night life. Fast food restaurants are everywhere, as are designer clothes shops and a gazillion souvenir shops.

At the hostel, I got talking to a gay Croatian guy who’d ended up Israel instead of Japan when he broke up with his boyfriend. There’s enough material there for a series of novels. He and an American were talking to each other in fluent Hebrew when I arrived, despite both also speaking English. While in Israel…

With their help, I located a KFC on the beachfront and continued with my tradition of a meal in each country. I opted for a 2-Twister meal at a stupid price approximating £5. Ouch. And I couldn’t finish it, so I left one of the Twisters in my rucksack for “later”. Back at the hostel, I had a shower, a snooze and woke up before my alarm went off at midnight.

Noa and two of her friends were outside to pick me up and take me to the Dungeon Club. This was like going back to a good old metal club – underground, cheap beer, expensive entry fee and everyone clad in black. Of course, the women looked far better than the men! In my opinion, anyway.

Tonight was a special performance by a guy from England, though he spoke perfect Hebrew. There was an annual festival taking place promoting all kinds of body modification thingies – tattoos, piercings and the like. Our mad chap was a bit of what the Indians would call a fakir – he did very painful looking things and made them seem easy. To whit: stapling balloons to his back and having people pop them by throwing darts at him; lying on a bed of nails with someone stood on his back; standing on broken glass, then lying on it with another buxom woman treading on him; poking a kebab skewer through his abdomen; and hanging himself from the ceiling via hooks poked through the flesh of his shoulderblades.

Nutter.

And I just found out he may well be on my flight on Wednesday. That’ll be interesting. I just hope he doesn’t go for an altitude body suspension record off one of the wings.

I got talking to quite a few people at the club, including another typically lovely Israeli girl called Hen who invited me to see her parents’ kibbutz. Well, how often do you get the chance to see a genuine Israeli kibbutz? As a result, I ended up crashing at Hen’s flat to make the journey easier in the morning. Unfortunately, all my stuff was in Noa’s car as we got split up and couldn’t find each other at the end of the night!

Note that this “stuff” included my spare Twister and I had the munchies. Nnooooooooo!

I never made it back to the hostel, making it quite expensive on a “per hour” basis.

Last night was another late one. A small group of us wandered up to Zion Square and surrounds for a bite to eat and a beer. And another beer with a free shot. And another of each. And more beer. Then some beer. Finally, we drank beer. We found an amazing bar with no seats, no toilet but beer at 8 Shekels for a large bottle. OK, technically it was just a shop but seeing as there are no laws regarding drinking on the street, or night suddenly became a lot cheaper.

We sat on the steps outside of the Tower of David Museum until shortly before sunrise. I keep forgetting that this means it’s hard for me to get to sleep as I’m still crashed out on the roof. So I snuck into my sleeping bag at around 5:30 and woke at 11:00 stewing in my own sweat. Niiiice.

I caught up with Dawud, one of the guys from the night before, and we walked back to the museum which this time was open. For 30 Shekels (20 for students) it’s a very interesting couple of hours, detailing the history of Jerusalem as a city from its tiny beginnings to the huge place it is now. It’s an interesting story and pretty much involves different groups of people kicking the previous “tenants” out every few hundred years and converting the existing religious buildings into different ones. Or burning them to the ground. Whatever took their fancy.

The building housing the museum is the Citadel of the Tower of David which has been restored incredibly well. Starting this weekend, the excavations area on the center is being used to host some kind of modern music concert thing with some bizarre instruments. These are permanently fixed into the surroundings and give a very unusual feel to the otherwise sedate setting.

The whole thing’s definitely worth a visit. Nicely laid out, plenty of information without an overload and a good variety of ways of presenting the details. Some of the forced perspective sculptures are very cool!

Looks like I’m off out for food and beers again later. Oh dear. Especially as one of my bank transfers seems to have been delayed for no readily apparent reason and I only have £2 in my current account. Argh.

I’m sure most of you have heard of Bethlehem. Well, that’s where I went today. The trip is only a short one from Jerusalem – maybe 20 minutes and 3 1/2 Shekels – but the security once you get there is tantamount to entering a different country.

For those who don’t know, Bethlehem is part of the “West Bank” area which covers most of the major religiously significant areas bordering Jordan. It is currently under Israeli rule/control, though is classed as a separate state in some ways. Postage stamps, for instance, bought here are only valid here – “outside”, you must purchase Israeli ones.

The entire area – and it’s not much less than half of the landmass of Israel – is literally fenced and walled off. Checkpoints are stationed around it and people are required to show ID passes and paperwork to get through. As a foreigner, this amounts to flashing a passport. To a Palestinian (one from within the West Bank) it seems they have to apply for permission to be able to leave the area and travel.

The size of the wall when you see it is astounding. At a guess I’d say it’s around 12m tall and gun towers are visible. The inner surfaces are covered in graffiti. Within the walls, police patrol with loaded guns which is different from Jerusalem where they’re allowed to walk around with battered, unloaded rifles.

After I progressed through the cavernous and sparsely-populate checkpoint, I followed a series of caged walkways around and through the wall to an area heaving with taxis. Of course, they all started yelling that the distance to town was five kilometers or something, and in fairness I did know it was a little bit of a stroll. There are buses, but I’m not sure where they go from.

One of the taxi drivers admitted they were getting no trade right now, and I can believe it. I see the buses heading to Bethlehem every day and they’re rarely more than a third full – and not everyone goes to the end of the line. As such, they were desperate for business so I got a very fair price on the ride in, but had to rebuff the driver as he incessantly tried to convince me I wanted a guide to take me around all the sights. In fairness, some of the major ones are as far as 9 miles out of Bethlehem itself.

He dropped me off at the Church of the Nativity which is apparently built over the site of the original barn and manger. As with a lot of churches, it’s shared by a handful of different denominations. There are several entrances, but the main one is actually tiny. Over the years – mainly early on – it was reduced in size to prevent invaders riding in on horseback.

The main hall you walk into is obviously very old with stained pillars holding up the impressive wooden roof. At the front is a fairly ornate altar decorated with lamps and chandeliers, though it’s not as “showy” as some similar places I’ve seen. Off to the side is a doorway leading down to the Grotto.

This area was quite busy when I descended, with a tour group of (I think) Spaniards ooh-ing and aah-ing in a lot more respect than I confess to being able to muster. A baby had been placed in the location of the original manger. The poor sod was there for ages to the point where I thought that maybe he was a permanent prop until his mother picked him up and dropped him at the spot of Jesus’ birth a couple of meters away. Up till now, the entire tour group had been crawling on all fours and kissing the metal-marked spot. As the child was brought forward, the crowd started to sing (in Spanish… or maybe it was Italian, I don’t know) and the whole scene took on a very bizarre and macabre feel. I felt like I was watching The Omen part ten or something. It’s hard to explain but the whole thing really creeped me out so I walked up the stairs and left them to it.

Walking around the rest of the church it was obvious how many wings have been added as the time’s gone on. Different styles are visible, and some areas are simply just so much newer you couldn’t mistake them for part of the original building. There’s a lovely garden in a courtyard, a monastery, some doors added as a celebration of the Pope’s visit in 2000 and a really nice statue of St George slaying the dragon. I nipped back around to the Grotto now that the scary people had left and got some better pictures, including some of a fascinating leather (I think) “tapestry” covering the walls.

My stomach was making warning sounds, so I picked up some postcards and settled down for an overpriced shawarma (a falafel with chicken, basically). Those of you who normally get cards should have them soon, complete with Bethlehem postmark!

By now it was after 2pm and the Milk Grotto had reopened after it’s long lunch break. This is the site where Mary hid with Jesus before they fled over the border to Egypt. It’s named after some white stone in the floor, apparently created when some of Mary’s milk spilled on it. The section of floor is roped off, but presumably accessible should anyone need a handy miracle, for which the floor has been attributed over the years.

It’s a very small chapel to look around and after taking a few photos, I begin to walk back to Manger Square to locate a taxi. I didn’t even get that far when a guy walking the other direction asked if I needed on and walked me to his cousin’s cab. Another ten Shekels and I was back at the checkpoint. I had a brief argument with a small boy who was so adamant that I wanted his 5-Shekel chewing gum that he was trying to force it into my pockets as a “free gift” before asking me for money. Eventually, thankfully, he gave up and I got back through security and back onto my bus to Jerusalem.

Oh, last night I caught up with Noa again and was taken out for Yemenite food in a place next door to meat burger. Interesting… they do two types of pastry, bith slightly sweet. One looks like a fig roll, the other a pancake. They’re slightly sweet and eaten with a fresh tomato sauce dip and a side salad. Not bad and the price was good. But still not as fulfilling as a Meat Burger!

It’s only just gone lunchtime and already this is one of those weird days you get when travelling. I’m sat in an archaic stone building, CSI is on TV with Arabic subtitles, the sound of Pink Floyd’s Another Brick In The Wall is drifting through from a PC somewhere and earlier today I saw a man in Orthodox Jewish clothing playing If I Were a Rich Man on the clarinet on a street corner.

A quick catchup on the last couple of days. I’ve been back down to the West Wall twice until finally I got there at a time when the entrance to the nearby Temple Mount was open. This is the third most important Muslim site in the world, and also highly important to the Orthodox Jews. The Dome of the Rock atop it is very pretty indeed. Gold roof, intricate mosaic walls and guards everywhere. For more information on its significance to various religions, check out this Wikipedia article.

I’ve spent a lot of time lazing around talking to many people in the hostel. I think I’ve encountered more Americans in this one location than I have in the rest of my travels over the last 14 months. Not all are religiously inclined, just curious regarding this fascinating country.

I went out with two of these guys and another Englishman for dinner and drinkies last night. We chowed down at the wonderfully named Meat Burger which was delicious. I don’t think they charged me for my beer either. Bonus. Next, we stopped at a bar called Stardust where – as with just about everywhere – people were watching a Tel Aviv derby match on the TV.

As we ordered beers, one of the staff noticed my shirt and told me that the guy who runs the bar is a Newcastle fan. He pointed out a Newcastle bar sign and shortly the manager introduced himself and bought me a beer. He knew his stuff as well, and we had a great conversation for half an hour or so. Any bar which has Blaydon Races on the jukebox is OK by me!

We moved on to Mike’s Place, am American hangout, afterwards. An Israeli guy was downstairs playing some pretty darned good blues on the acoustic guitar in the basement and we got talking to one of the staff and two German women who pretty much made up the entire populace of the bar. It’s the quiet season, it seems.

I think we staggered back to the hostel at 3am where I loaned my laptop to James so that he could Skype home. The next thing I knew, I woke up at 6am in the lobby. Whoops. And here’s me paying £3.50 for a mattress on the roof.

Due to lack of sleep, my planned trip to Bethlehem just wasn’t going to be worthwhile, so I wandered the streets and did some more netsurfing and reading instead. As I sat here typing this up, explosions erupted in the street – fireworks, we assume as part of the 40th Anniversary of Reunification celebrations. Some people aren’t quite so happy about this, but sadly it’s that kind of country. Still, it was a nice display for the neutral viewers amongst us.

I’m off out for a late dinner with Noa in a bit, but I’ll leave you with a word of warning: if a cat doesn’t want to be picked up, let the thing go. Those back claws are pretty mean. Ow. Mind, the same cat was wrapping itself around my legs and purring today.

Oh, and I’ve chucked a handful more pics up on Fotopic.