Horses At The Top Of Mount Meron

Ever experienced something totally unexpected, and then an even more unexpected something comes along to completely blow your mind? That is exactly what happened this past Passover, on a family outing, as we first discovered this stunning rain pool on the top of Mount Meron, that had gone totally beneath our radar despite living not that far from it, and then, in this isolated mountaintop location with red soil, and breathtaking views, all to ourselves, a horse show? A very memorable afternoon for our family, and I also took some wonderful portraits of the kids, to boot.

I you are wondering about the boy in the photo, he is a Druze Israeli and lives in Beit Jaan, a Druze village not far from this location. He is wearing traditional Druze pants and a white skull cap. Religious Druze people have their own very specific dress code which distinguishes them from everyone else. There are around 150,000 Druze people in Israel, and they are citizens generally, and the boys serve in the army, and we work together. It is true that the greatest Druze populations live in Lebanon and Syria, with whom we are not at peace, so that can get sticky, but generally it’s all good. Druze are not Muslim by the way, and their history is very interesting, look it up, I just did!

Okay, back to the story of the horses…….come along with me!

My daughter and I set out for the rain pool, with the men to follow 20 or so minutes later. As we neared the rain pool, we saw two men approaching on horseback, which was a bit scary as we were by ourselves. There was a group of men up on the hill a bit that I mistakenly thought were Israeli soldiers, though in fact they were the friends of these guys on horseback. Hmmmm. The guys on the horses thankfully kept on riding and we enjoyed exploring this amazing site. Having not seen the boys in quite a while, we decided to go back and find them, which we did, and then the five of us walked back to the rain pool. Once we got there, again, the horses appeared and my husband asked them whether it is safe for the horses to drink from the rain pool (yes.)

A few words were exchanged, and then they decided to give us a little show with their stunning horses, who both happened to be male. “Watch this” the boy said.

Gorgeous?
And then the horses reared and it was quite dramatic!
And that is life my friends, the unexpected is often the most amazing part of the journey!