Day Three in Jerusalem (Friday)

On Friday we had a busy walking day. We wanted to start with the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the morning, then make it to the market about 3 miles away to see the hustle and bustle before the start of the Jewish Sabbath, and then 3 miles back to the Lion's gate to do the via dolorosa walk at 4 pm.

This time I think we entered the city by the Jaffa gate. We spent a little time exploring a castle that was right inside the gate. 

And then we made our way to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. This is the site where many other Christians believe Christ was crucified and buried. It is possible, but we didn't have the same feelings while we were there. It was super crowded and noisy, had a very strong smell of incense that was making it very hard to breathe, and it was mainly just walking around seeing the inside of the church.

This was a stone that they believe Christ's body was prepared on before being placed in the tomb. Many people would lay their heads on it and cry and pray.

This huge painting right behind it was pretty impressive.

Upstairs in the church you could see a section of the rock that they believe is Golgotha. The church was built over the hill so this part that is open in glass is the only section you can see. They believe that this crack came from the earthquake that happened when He died.

A couple more parts of the hill.

Then what they believe is the tomb was located inside this smaller older church that was built first, with the larger current church built all around it. We had to get in a long line to get inside of this church. And then we just went into a couple small rooms with the smallest and last one having a stone wall that I am guessing was the wall of the tomb. There was a priest stationed outside of that one and he made sure that everyone only got about 30 seconds at the wall. Lots of people prayed there when it was their turn and the priest had to be kind of forceful with moving people through.

The market was extra busy and fun when we made it there. We did get some cheap bread and fruit. We also got to try a lot of different dried fruit, like dried watermelon and dried starfruit. We spent an hour or so there and then made our way back into the old city. When we got to the Lion's Gate we were told that they were not doing the via dolorosa walk this month because of Ramadan. Although we had just walked some distance we were not too disappointed that we couldn't do this. Usually the walk is led by some monks and it is supposed to follow the trail that Christ took while carrying the cross through the city. It makes some stops at sights of his trial before Pilate and where he was beaten and ends at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. However, it also makes stops where churches were built to commemorate the first, second, and third time he supposedly stumbled while carrying the cross. I think it is generally recognized that this is not the actual walk Christ did, but we thought it would be a fun experience anyway. Since that was canceled we just wandered through the old city a little longer. 

With the start of the Sabbath everything was pretty quiet as we made our way back to our hotel. All of the shops and restaurants were closed and there was hardly anyone on the street. It was a huge contrast to what we saw just a couple hours earlier.