Walking in Israel’s Negev Desert: Hod Akev, Ein Akev & Divshon Rise
After a 45-minute car ride from Beersheba, my friend & I arrived to Midreshet Ben-Gurion, the place where Israel’s primary national founder, David Ben-Gurion and his wife are buried. It was 7:30 AM. The earlier we would start walking, the better (That day the temperature peaked at 33°C, 91.4°F). About 16–20 kilometers awaited us (which are about 7:30 hours of walking including breaks).
Right at the start there is a pretty big decline. You could choose to walk on road or off-road. Off-road was faster and we wanted to start the trail ASAP.
At the bottom of the serpentine road there were some-what of a parking lot. When we passed by, people were eating breakfast outside of their tents. We started walking the 4x4 red road (See upper image). About 2 kilometers in, there is 800-meter deep well worth visiting. Throw some rocks and see what sound they make. Trust me, it is an experience worth having.
We kept going. It wasn’t that hot yet but we started feeling the heat a bit. As people who live around here, it wasn’t “a mood killer” for us but it is worth acknowledging if you’ll want to come here as well. In this trip, there are practically no shadowed spots where you could rest, so don’t forget sunscreen and a good hat :)
We came to our first crossroads, where we should have switched the blue 4x4 road with the red one.
We started walking the blue trail. Eventually, we decided that because we are more flexible than vehicles, we can shortcut a bit and go from the crossroads straight to yellow-red line.
The route was harder than the planned one. There were lots of ground folds, though climbing and declining them tens of times was the shorter road. Maybe it saved us some precious time. The hard part was still ahead of us. We wanted to complete it as early as possible, before the heat became too much. After about an hour of walking, we started climbing Hod Akev. The climb is about a 200m elevation from around 350m to 576m at its peak. 40 minutes. This image was taken at 9:41AM, about 2 hours after we began walking from the top of the serpentine road:
We are pretty new to this, and this was our first time learning the lesson — distances in the dessert are way longer than they look in our head. A simple “100 meter” climb could take us 10 minutes. Anyway, it was time to start. Don’t take the words I write too dramatically. To be honest, we had no idea what's to come and how actually long our trip will be.
There were some places where it was pure-horizontal climb. No walking.
Eventually, we got to the top!
At 10:20AM, less than 3 hours after we started, we got to the top of Hod Akev. Now it was time to decline and move towards Ein Akev, where there was finally some refreshing water for us. Two hours later and about five hours since we started, we arrived the Ein Akev spring. Make sure you don’t drink this water. Only if you are extremely thirsty and have no people around to ask for water — you can start thinking about it. It is totally swimmable though, so make sure you take some advantage of that! Also, if you want to jump — the spring is 6+ meters deep. So you shouldn’t hurt the ground beneath if you’ll jump.
We ate our sandwiches, rested a little (as this was the only shadowed spot we’ve been in since 7:40 AM). And looked at the maps. At first, we went the wrong road. We started going the blue 4x4 road as this was the only road that seemed logical. But then we looked left, and a small road could be seen from afar. We sighed a little. Another elevation awaited us. No better time to start then now! It was 1:00 PM. We started walking towards our car. Our way back wasn’t too long, but it was packed with elevations and declines.
After 1 hour of walking, you will encounter some Bedouin tents. There is, actually, a tent made just for you, a fellow traveler — as a point to chill and eat at. There is even a woman there, that if you’ll talk with in advance (or maybe in travelling season she’ll just be there), she’ll prepare you a meal and boil you tea for a small price. Today, however, was too hot for things like that. When we passed there, it was as hot as it gets in a 24-hour day. 2:00 PM, the only thing we’ve seen was the family’s children playing outside.
The hardest moment began when we started seeing our parking place. It was only 7 hours ago. It was so far, and it seemed that we experienced so much since then. But it was the last stretch now and maybe, just maybe, even some sadness arose. You can see the serpentine road in the distance here:
From here it was a huge decline and then the same rise which we declined earlier. It took us one hour since we passed that tent. Looking back, it felt much longer. Finally, at 3:00 PM, we were about to be in our car. It took us 7 hours and 20 minutes, including all breaks to do the whole trail. In distance, the road is about 20 kilometers. It’ll take about 16–18 kilometers if you’ll start from the parking lot beneath the serpentine. Getting into the car was more relieving than words can describe.
What an awesome experience.
If you’ll want to walk the same route as us, here are some disclaimers I want to give you:
- You’ll ride here through fire zones. Don’t panic, just don’t go offroad.
- Have a map. Amud Anan is fantastic. Query for “מדרשת בן גוריון” to find the map you need.
- If its winter, check that the road is safe from floods or rockfall areas.
- If its summer, be sure you are prepared for the hot weather mentally. If there's more than 35°C (95°F) that day. Shortcut that road through trails that are on the map. The earlier you start the better.
- Make sure you have at least 4 litters of water, a lot of sunscreen and a good, 360 degrees hat.
- Bring food. You will get hungry. It’s a one-day trip, sandwiches and snacks will be enough.
- This trail is considered to be hard, so make sure you are prepared for them 16+ kilometers.