Blessed Rain Water at Jewish Legion Memorial, Shiloh Junction

Yesterday one of my walking partners called and suggested that we take a walk to see streams of water at the Shiloh Junction. Her timing was great, and I was able to take a break from my Shabbat cooking to join her.

Since our time and walking prowess are rather limited, we took her car to the Shiloh Junction and walked across the road to the Shiloh Valley park and hiking trail. It has also been dedicated as the Jewish Legion in Binyamin Memorial.

During World War One, the first Jewish fighting force was established, the Jewish Legion, and one of the areas it got to was Shiloh. So, last summer a memorial was set up at the Shiloh Junction.

Today, the area just west of Shiloh is a Jewish agricultural area with olive groves and vineyards. Since it's part of the Emek Shiloh, Shiloh Valley, it's extremely fertile. When we came to live in Shiloh in 1981, the entire area was barren. But in the past twenty years, this area has been one of the most profitable agricultural sites around. Prize-winning Meshek Achiya Olive Oil grows olives here, and a number of prize-winning wine companies get their grapes from here, too.

Experts can taste the difference between rain-watered produce and artificial irrigation, so the accumulation of rainwater here is very important, Baruch Hashem, thank Gd.

Gush Shiloh, Grape-Growing Center of World

Yesterday my friends and I took a short "road trip" around the communities, hills and valleys surrounding Shiloh. We're all living here well over thirty years and remember when Shiloh was considered rather isolated. Two of us are from the days when Shiloh was the only Jewish community between Ariel, Tapuach and Beit El, Ofra. Today, not only are there lots of small and medium communities in the area, but Eli is even larger than the more veteran Shiloh.

For us the big surprise was the amount of agriculture, more specifically the massive vineyards and groves of olive trees. It's easy to see that these are commercially cultivated. Everything is neat and carefully pruned, unlike those growing in my garden.

We ended our little trip by picnicking near the Givat Harel Vineyards, a "pot luck" lunch, which we shared.

Here are some photos:

It bothered us that the cluster of grapes wasn't shaped accurately.  

Most of the photos are from east of Shiloh. We didn't go all the way to the Allon Road. Givat Harel is northwest of Shiloh. It's clear that Gd created this Land to grow grapes and olives.