Holy Land Pilgrimage with Gila

 

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"
BLESSED IS THE ONE WHOSE STRENGTH IS IN THEE
WHOSE HEART IS SET ON PILGRIMAGE"
PSALM 84

 


Gila Yudkin guiding on the Mount of Olives

A pilgrimage to the Holy Land is a journey of the heart.  It’s a walk in the Land of the Bible that holds the roots of your faith.  It’s a celebration of the spirit in thanksgiving, prayer, song, and fellowship, with sacred rites such as baptism, communion, a reading of the Beatitudes, a sail on the stormy sea.  It’s a life-changing experience and guaranteed to impact forever how you “see” the Bible, hear the stories and “walk the talk.”

Anticipating a pilgrimage to the Holy Land?  Bible References will help you locate major stories pertinent to the sites you’ll be visiting.  After returning from the Holy Land, having studied Scripture “on location,” you will be reading the Bible in three-dimensional color, rather than in black and white.

 

Interested in creative ways of visiting well-known sites, as well as those lesser-known off-the-beaten pathways?  then look at the most consistently popular classics from my collection of "Holy sites: Gila's Highlights" written from 2005 to 2020.  Read my highlights on Absalom, Adullam, Arbel, Armageddon, Azekah, or fifty-seven more, all the way to the elusive Ziklag, one of David's hideaways.
 
Join me as the archeologists find new interpretations to old puzzles such as the location of the Pool of Siloam, the identity of the balm of Gilead and whether the ivory pomegranate was ever present in Solomon’s temple.
 
In “Let’s see where the Priestly Benediction was found”, I interviewed the late Gabi Barkay about his discovery of two silver amulets engraved with the oldest biblical text ever found.  Come with me as I visit Herod’s tomb at Herodion with the late archeologist Ehud Netzer.  I am on tour with the late Adam Zertal as he leads us to what he claims is the site of Joshua’s altar on Mount Ebal.
 
Like to read profiles of notorious celebrities or biographies of alpha achievers?  Holy Land Headliners profiles personalities who have left their mark on the Holy Land, including a femme fatale eyeing Jericho, a bishop lost in the Wilderness of the Temptation, a Connecticut Yankee who audaciously tackles Biblical geography and a headless knighted archeologist buried on Mount Zion.
 
Eager to know more about female characters of the Bible?  Heroines fleshes out
profiles of Mary Magdalena, Bathsheba, Elizabeth, Jezebel, Abishag, the Witch of En Dor and Veronica (who is actually not biblical!).
 
Try the Top Twelve popular articles this month for a flavor of what my website has to offer. Scroll down for the latest articles and updates posted since 2025.
 
Tips for Tours gives you fun and practical ideas culled from collaboration with hundreds of ministers, priests, rabbis, teachers, professors, and facilitators I have team-guided with over the years.  If you plan to explore Jerusalem on your own, you may want to order my singular “Explore Jerusalem’s Soul”.  Definitely download or print out my free guide to the gates of the Old City.
 

COMING TO JERUSALEM? 
BOOK GILA for a customized private tour

 
Ask Gila answers queries about holy land snakes, spiders, flash floods, and camel riding.
 
About Gila is an interview with yours truly, answering questions asked, time and again, usually on that first drive from the Ben-Gurion Airport.
 

You may want to check out my memoir in progress, tentatively titled “Holy Land Haunts: Gila’s Misadventures while guiding over four decades, soon to be five (!!).”  It will eventually include a chapter about a fire-bombing on the Mount of Olives, a shooting outside the Pool of Bethesda, an escape from Samaria in the early 1980s, broken bones and shiners (there were quite a few!) and an unexpected tour leader gift of an ”electric can-opener” after a fall at Masada.  Stay tuned.

 
Send your comments, questions, bookings, poems or anecdotes to gila@itsgila.com. I love to receive unconventional or challenging queries.
 
Have fun exploring these Holy Land resources and contact me if you’d like to book me as your holy land guide.
 
Have YOU been there, done that?
 
Have you mounted a camel on the Mount of Olives?

Have you stood in the battlefield of David versus Goliath?

Have you walked the ramparts like Nehemiah?

Mount of Olives   

David versus Goliath

  Old City ramparts

 
Have you toured the Temple Mount with Gila?

Have you heard Gila tell Cleopatra's story at Casearea

Have you practiced with the traditional sling that killed Goliath?

Temple Mount tour with Gila

Cleopatra & Caesarea

David's sling?


GILA YUDKIN TCHERNIKOVSKI 64A JERUSALEM ISRAEL
gila@itsgila.com

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Holy Land Photography by Gila Yudkin