Two Caves of Elijah the Prophet at Mount Carmel, Israel

It happened that my focus of this winter travels was the Mount Carmel.

And today I place a first post of cave of Elijah the Prophet. It will be a cave, which usually visit Christians and it is situated on the upper slopes of Mount Carmel inside a church “Stella Maris” belonging to the Catholic Order of Carmelites.

So, we have drive up from Hadar up to Haifa Square Stella Maris. If you are traveling by auto, don’t miss an observation point on your way, and have enjoyed a place whence Haifa began (it called Bat Galim – the Daughter of Waves. Well, with bus excursion you will stop a little bit above. Also you can take photos from Stella Maris but I advice, don’t miss the first one.

Pay attention to some objects outside before we’ll enter to the church. The first one is located across the street – a former charity house of the monastery (now the naval base of Israel Army). The building is remained but unfortunately some fragments of painting were lost. I’ve retouched a photo minimal. A plot of painting is: Elijah’s the Prophet ascention. A statue of Virgin Mary is situated in front of entrance to this building.

Now we turn to the church and see the memorial to fallen French soldiers in shape of pyramid. The monument is devoted who died here after Napoleon’s unsuccessful campaign and siege of Acre when, because of events on France, he deserted army in Palestine. There is inscription “How the mighty have fallen” from King David’s lamentation over Saul and Jonathan and I’ll tell the next time about this connection. We won’t enter inside church today. I’ll postpone it for some days and now, before we’ll enter and light our small candle in the cave, some more photos of courtyard of man’s monastery “The Brotherhood of Virgin Mary from Mount Carmel”.