We stopped briefly in a grocery store to secure provisions for lunch, and then headed to the visitor center of the Ramon Crater, where we boarded two jeeps for off-roading through the crater. Our jeep guide, Adam, explained that this is one of only seven similarly formed craters in the world, the other six being also in Israel or in the northern Sinai Peninsula. And in fact geologists around the world have taken to using the Hebrew word--machtesh--to describe this phenomenon, rather than crater.
From the floor of the crater, we could see the different layers of sedimentary rock and the vivid colors they reveal. We could also see how, on those very rare days when it does rain, the water flows and accumulates. There was no rain in the forcast this day, but when there is, visitors have to be very careful about flash floods. Sometimes the Negev will receive three years' worth of rain in one day.
We could also see past mining sites, all of which have been shut down since the Machtesh Ramon had been designated as a nature preserve.
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