Places to visit
Wadi Talcid and Firan, Um Zuka
This track is very beautiful, relatively short, and inspiring. Before starting this walk, it is essential to know a few things: 1. The route passes through the territory of the Palestinian Authority. 2. The only recommended time of year for this track is between Purim and Passover 3. Cars with an Israeli registration number are not covered by Israeli Insurance. The route starts at the arranged parking lot at Kvish haBeka, ascends, and descends back to the road. This route is a circular route along the lower part of Nahal Talkhid and the lower part of Wadi Piran. Many beautiful flowers bloom along the trail in winter and spring, and this is the only convenient time for hiking in reserve. You must take safety precautions into account. The route, as already mentioned, passes beyond the green line. These places are considered to be relatively quiet without too many problems. However, the situation can change at any time. Before entering the route, it is necessary to coordinate your actions with the IDF and the All-Israel Hiking and Travel Center 02-6222211. The route is not considered difficult, but it requires certain physical skills such as climbing on braces and rope, sliding, balancing, and pulling up.
The parking lot is visible from the side of the road. Signs lead to it, and a large tree grows in the center. At the entrance, there is a billboard with instructions for visiting the reserve and rules of conduct. During the flowering grasses, the gazebo near the parking lot becomes a permanent place of duty for the Israeli border guards.
The rocky canyon Nahal Talkid is formed by winter streams of water. The canyon is narrow and deep.
The beginning of the ascent is relatively gentle; the route is marked with a blue marking line. To the right of the trail is the deep canyon of the Talcid brook. The name Talcid comes from the word conglomerate. This refers to the rock created by a conglomerate of small stones in the stream bed.
Quite quickly, after a relatively flat part, the trail enters the stream bed, and the ascent begins along small waterfalls.
The trail runs along small waterfalls and soon ascends to a large rock. You can use a rope or climb with clamps on the south bank of the stream.
Staples accompany the rope. But lifting is still not easy and requires pull-up skills.
Immediately after climbing the rope, a narrow passage like a hole leads under a large rock.
After the hole passage under the rock, there is another challenge, which you can overcome both with the help of a ladder and clips in the stream's northern bank.
High sheer cliffs mark the exit from the rocky part of the Talcid stream. The border between bare rocks and steppe meadows changes very sharply.
The exit from the Talcid stream is the exit from the blue marking route, and the transition to the green marking route begins. It walks along the ridge and descends into the Firan stream.
An almost straight line marks the border between the steppe and the rocks. From here, a trail of transparent white marking rises to the ridge. Usually, this designation is adopted either for dead ends or rescue exits. In this case, we are talking about the ascent and descent to the observation deck on the Jordan Valley.
The observation deck offers a view of the meadows of the highlands in the west and the valley in the east.
The observation deck offers a beautiful view of the valley and mountains of Jordan. A series of agricultural settlements stretch along the Jordanian side of the border. They appeared along the border after the events of Black September as part of the settlement of the situation in the Israeli-Jordanian relations under the patronage and funding of the United States. Since then, the border between Jordan and Israel has become much calmer than borders with other countries. By the way, the Kingdom of Jordan did not participate in the Yom Kippur War, which broke out only a few years after these events.
The green marking trail gradually descends into the bed of the Firan Creek. This route will be marked with red markings.
There is a huge rock at the beginning of the descent into the canyon of the Firan stream. In early March, the iris from Mount Gilboa blooms here. This is the southernmost point of the range of this plant.
The geological difference between the creek Talcid and Firan is that Talcid has conglomerate structures, which explains its name, while Firan is completely rocky.
The name of the brook Firan comes from the Arabic word for a stove. This is due to the tremendous heat that rises from the stream's canyon during the summer months.
One of the most famous challenges of the Firan Trail is the huge rock that blocked the lower part of the trail. You need to crawl under it.
The track ends at route 90. You can return to the parking lot through a low hillock.
Next to the path that leads to the parking lot, we will begin to see a lush bloom of bristly mallow. This means that you have visited these places on time. The flowering of mallow marks the transition to late spring, which means that these places will be beautiful and cool only after a year.
Don't be afraid to get lost in new places!
