First day in Jerusalem

Picture taken from the top of our Hotel --The Old City night picture

December 10, 2010—Friday
At the end of the day, we almost ended up without food for the Sabbath and nowhere to park the car. We rushed out in the car at about 3 pm to go to a supermarket. We arrived almost an hour before sundown, but the supermarket was closed, as were just about all the other in Jerusalem. I had thought they would close at sundown for the Sabbath, but I guess they close early, a couple of hours early.
On this little jaunt, we also discovered that those far left lanes for going straight at a traffic light weren’t just for buses. It seems that the middle lanes that turn left in front of the left lane apply just about everywhere there are three lanes in town. Logan jumped out of the car at a light to check on a store he saw, and instead of being able to turn left and go pick him up, I was in the left lane that had to go straight. So I proceeded down the street for several blocks before being able to turn around and come back because those turning lanes and go straight lanes are often separated by a fence. Fortunately, Logan did not panic when it took me five or ten minutes to get back to him. He waited patiently on a corner.
It was after we headed back to park the car in the parking deck that we found out that the parking decks also close early for the Sabbath—even though they are entirely automated. They have pay stations where you insert your ticket and then insert payment. So we ended up driving around for a while, trying not to get lost. I thought I was going to have to spend the night in the car on a side street somewhere. We tried the parking deck for the David Hotel, but the cost was 12 shekels an hour, or about $3.50.
Logan solved the problem for us. There was a buses only parking lot by the car lot. He got the operator to let us park in the bus lot, which Logan said, he thought the guy does under the table. So we safely parked the car. We will take it out to tomorrow morning to go to Church, but we won’t be able to park it again until after sundown at 4:30 when the Sabbath has ended.
We were able to find some non-Jewish shops open to buy food in the Old City so we won’t starve on Sunday. We went to dinner in a restaurant, and the hotel has breakfast for us.
It was a little tense after a long day of walking. Logan said today was like opening a new area on his mission in Brazil. You walk all day long.
He was awake at 4:30 this morning, and after half an hour or so of his tossing and turning, I asked if he was awake. We both got up then and got ready to start the day. We went up on the roof to watch the sunrise and then headed to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. There were a few tour groups there by the time we arrived about 6:45. After an hour there in which we heard monks singing and saw a Eucharist, we came back to the hotel for breakfast. From there, we walked down to the Zion Gate on the south and went to the traditional place of David’s Tomb, an Upper Room, the Church of Peter and the Rooster (Caiaphas’ Palace), the Archaeological Park on the south temple wall, tried to find Annas House, the Western Wall, the Church of the Flagellation and the Condemnation where Jesus was put before the crowd by Pilate and scourged by the Roman soldiers, Stephen’s Gate (the Lion Gate) where Stephen was crucified, and then we walked through the Muslim Cemetery to the Golden Gate or the Gate Beautiful that led to the temple.
It has been a long day, but we heard they are expecting heavy rain on Sunday and probably Monday, so our touring may get cut short.
I am looking forward to attending Church tomorrow at the BYU Jerusalem Center.