Here's our A square after two weeks of digging - we've moved a lot of dirt, and I've made a lot of progress physically. Everyday this week I've managed to hike all the way up the hill from the bus without having to have a break, and today I carried down TWO full buckets of pottery without needing Nancy to rescue me. It was a really good feeling - now, how do I keep this up at home??!!
I did breakfast duty today, for the second time this trip. I enjoy it...gives my back a break at least! Here's what the breakfast set up looks like...usually there are tomatoes and cucumbers, bread, jam, chocolate spread (like Nutella, but not quite the same), hard boiled eggs, pickled fish, cheese, coffee, and usually one variable item - some days it was pastries, some days it was pudding, and today it was tuna...icky!
After breakfast Dr. Schuler took us on a tour of next year's dig site. For the last few years he's been working on the North East Church, but it's pretty well uncovered now, so he's looking at digging up the church in the area they believe was the domestic quarter of the hill. The location has an amazing view, and would be fantastic to come back and work on. The potential problem is that the Israeli government owns the hill, and they hold the dig permit. After next year, the current permit expires. They're in negotiations to renew it, but because no synagogues have been found at Hippos yet, the site isn't a big priority for the government, so we shall see what happens with that.
In this first picture, you can see the team standing in what would have been the main part of the church.
This second picture shows what was probably a paved narthex area - we can tell this because there's only grass there and no trees or bushes.
Tomorrow we head off on our trip to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. I won't have internet access until Sunday night, so all my loyal readers are going to have to live in suspense until then. :)
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