Preconceived notion

Due to the select pictures I had seen throughout my life, I had what I thought was a distinct image of what Israel looked like.  I envisioned a dry, brown, desert-like country with sparse greenery. And while part of Israel does, in fact, look like that - primarily around the Dead Sea, the image I conjured up of the rest of the country couldn't have been farther than the truth.

The lush green rolling hills, the mass amounts of trees, the immaculate roadsides and the stunning glow of the landscape reflected in the rising sun took both my mother and my breath away.  With a welcome as warm as that one, neither of us cared that our flights arrived before dawn.