In spite of the late-night Tel Aviv street noise (Thursday night in Israel is the equivalent of our Friday night,) we slept well.

Today is a “shopping” day. We have made plans to spend the day with Meira and Carmi at various popular Tel Aviv shopping sites and markets.

Carmi and Meira rode up in a cab. We jumped in and rode to Allenby Street, where several markets, such as the popular Carmel Market, are located. We spent the next several hours browsing, people-watching and enjoying each other’s company. The day is sunny and warm with cool breezes coming off of the Mediterranean.

We stopped for a delicious lunch at Orna and Ella on chic Sheinkin Street, a very trendy “must-do” restaurant. Near our table, Meira spied a famous Israeli author and a well-known young Israeli actress.

After the delicious lunch (try the incredible Pavlova for desert) we shopped a while longer and then ended up on Dizengoff Street with thousands of people enjoying a Shabbat festival there. At 3:30pm we all decided we needed to rest so we headed back to the hotel and Meira and Carmi went home. They will pick us up this evening at 7:15pm for dinner with Carmi’s son Noam and Meira’s son Lior.

After a short rest, we walked down to the beach. Tel Aviv’s beaches are pristine, clean and full of people enjoying the weekend.

Back to the hotel for showers, then at 7:30pm Carmi, Meira and Lior picked us up at the hotel and we drove to an Italian restaurant where Carmi’s son Noam joined us for a very tasty dinner. My sea bass was excellent. The Israeli wine was surprisingly good and we all had a wonderful time. Noam had to be in Tiberius at 7:30am for an IronMan triathalon, so he and Lior said Lilah Tov at 9:30pm.

It was another wonderful evening but Meira had a surprise in store for us. We drove through Tel Aviv to her brother Yossi’s house. Yossi has an important job with the main Israeli newspaper. He had printed out the front page of the newspaper for July 8, 1949 and September 18, 1953 – our birthdays.

We thanked Yossi profusely and drove back to the hotel where we sat in the ground floor restaurant as Meira translated these pages for us. It was very special to us and we intend to have these pages framed.

At midnight we were all exhausted so we said Lilah Tov to Carmi and Meira, hugged them and then we climbed the stairs to our room on the 3rd floor and fell into bed.

Next Day