One of the most amazing things about living in Jerusalem is living within spitting distance of thousands of years of history. Caesarea (pronounced Keh-sar-ee-ya) is an old Roman town on the Mediterranean coast of Israel. It’s about an hour North of Tel Aviv, and about 90 minutes from Jerusalem. On the first official day of my “staycation,” we loaded the kids into the car and headed to Caesarea bright and early, in hopes of avoiding Israel’s punishing mid-day sun.
Bertrand, and surprisingly, three-year-old Jasmine*, is into Art-with-a-capital-A, so we started the day by stopping in a couple of the art galleries clearly designed to separate tourists from their money. It almost worked, but happily for us, none of the credit card machines in the port were working. Bullet dodged (just kidding, sweetheart, we’ll go back and get those paintings).
Post-gallery, we watched a short film on the history of the port town. As one of my colleagues described it, “hokey, but worth 15 minutes of your time to situate you historically.” And then we headed into the park to dance on the ruins of the Roman Empire.
So to speak.
Caesarea provides ample opportunities for kids to run around and climb the ruins. While parts are fenced off or under active archeological excavation, the vast majority of the park is open for exploration.
Both Jasmine and Grace had a wonderful time climbing up stairs, through tunnels, and exploring every corner of the ruined city.
After we finished exploring the park, we set out a quick picnic lunch (how did we manage to not get any pictures?!) across from the columns pictured below.
(A quick aside to anyone who hates on Israeli customer service: the folks at Caesarea were great. Even though it wasn’t their job to do so, the lovely ladies running the pre-tour film worked incredibly hard to get us tickets, once they realized that we hadn’t paid, we wanted to pay, the credit card machines weren’t working, the ATM wasn’t working, and that we had no cash. They figured it out graciously, then personally walked us to the gate so that the gatekeeper would believe us when we said we’d paid.)
* Definitely a humble brag.
Even I – continue to learn something new (about the Bible) every day!! Thanks… I had no idea that that is how Caesarea was pronounced this way…
Caesarea (pronounced Keh-sar-ee-ya)
I always heard it said, as pronounced – Ses-sar-ee-ya.
Your photos are beautiful… I especially love the one of Jasmine running there at the ruins. Neat to see first hand – true history.
Thanks for joining in with #CulturedKids! The columns in particular are very impressive. This looks like a fascinating place to visit – and if kids are able to run around, even better.
Nell (the Pigeon Pair and Me) recently posted: #CulturedKids November 2016
Culture, history AND the kids were able to run around freely – what a perfect family day out! Those roman ruins look mightily impressive. Thanks for the post! #CulturedKids
Jonny (Daisy the bus) recently posted: The volcanoes of the Auvergne
This sounds a fantastic site – it’s incredible to visit the whole area, to see all these ancient sites but I didn’t know much about Caesarea. Sounds a great one for kids with all the room to explore (and a little video to start which would probably get the thumbs up from my daughter!) #culturedkids
Cathy (MummyTravels) recently posted: Five things to do in Bandung with kids
How fantastic that the children could fun around – would certainly make visiting a lot more fun! It looks like an incredible site to visit.
Forgot- #culturedkids
Elizabeth (Wander Mum) recently posted: Review: Family Photos Made Easy With Splento
My kids love Cesarea. We took a great family guide who got the kids dressed up in costumes to teach them about the history of the beautiful coastal city. They were part of the story. We also loved being there for the horses and chariots show on Sukkot. Not a far drive from Jerusalem and worth the travel time.