Dead Sea Flash Flood

We were on our way back to Jerusalem from touring Masada. What we experienced yesterday is one more reason, why I never get tired of touring to the Dead Sea.

We were lucky, just as we started heading back toward the cable car, we had one of the rare experiences – it started to rain. To begin with just dripping, but before we got to the cable car, it was pouring.

The shelter is built to give shade, not against a desert torrential downpour, so we and all the other people waiting to go down got pretty drenched. Still, an experience, so we took it in our stride. We also knew that within long we would be indoors, and heading toward the car.

It kept raining, but I was not worried. After all it had been dry the better part of the day.

Some fifteen minutes north of Ein Gedi I noticed loads of cars parked alongside the road, and people scrambling on the mountain side. This got me a little worried. Was there a flash flood, so we could not get back to Jerusalem? Then I saw it – the flash flood coming over the mountain. A 400 meter high waterfall in the desert.

One of those extremely rare moments. We stopped, just like all the others. My photos do not make justice to the magnificence of these moments.

And then I saw the second waterfall – even bigger than the first. The first one was absorbed by the ground close to the road. This second one was flooding the road.

Then the police came and chased us all away – no stopping on the side of the road.

Actually it can be dangerous. If the water intensifies you can get swept away. Neither I nor my two tourists cared. The view was spectacular.

Unfortunately in the end we had to move on, as did all the other spectators, but we really had an exceptional day on Masada and at the Dead Sea.