Horbat Timna` Things to Do

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From the parking area you can see the mushroom formation in the distance and it will seem to be of no importance...but as you approach it over the open desert of the Timna landscape it will begin to "grow". Standing under its colorful "umbrella" of rock it seems to reach out to protect you from the hot southern sun of Israel.
Nearby there is also a miners village where those who worked the copper mines lived and worked thousands of years ago.

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The "Mushroom and a Half" is the famous Mushroom's poor brother. Although I think it is the more beautiful of the two, in terms of color it is more striking, a reddish ocher that is especially beautiful at sunset. The last photo shows Lea so you can have an idea of the size.

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The "new" Timna park has now put up these cheezy mock Egyptian statues along both sides of the entrance road, really BAD. The new cinema where you can watch a movie telling about Timna, its nature and history is almost as bad, but the information is good.
As you drive in you can see on your right hand side the Spiral.
The road looks like it goes off into nowhere, but keep driving you will get there.

Timna Park is actually a valley (the Valley of Timna), surrounded by steep mountains. The special Geology of the valley makes Timna Park unique for its rock formations, of which the Mushroom, Solomon's Pillars and the Arch are specifically noted.

Solomon's Pillars, found in the Timna Park just 40 kilometers north of Eilat is one of the main attractions there. The pillars rise above you between 20-30 meters sheer from the desert floor. There are several paths that you can take to reach the top, but the view from the bottom looking up is the best.

They estimate that this has been standing since the time when the Queen of Sheeba had her copper mines here along with King Solomon. The action of the gritty sand in the high winds in the changing seasons here have caused the weathering, NOT the action of water, of which there is very little here in the southern desert of Israel.
You can estimate its size by using Zohara and Gabrielle standing under the mushroom, it is not small by any strecth of the immaginaition.

One of the most famous sights in Timna is The Mushroom.

It is a red sandstone rock shaped by wind and water that looks like a gigantic mushroom.

But apart of this you can see many more amazing formations in Timna.

You can find this drawings on the stones, they represent the rituals and lifestyles of the people who lived on the area.

You can see scenes of hunting, animals, etc. but the most famous are the Charriots, the imagen of the egiptian charriots, that is situated in the narrow canyon

Here in Timna Park we can find the world's earliest mine, beloning to the period when man first learned to produce copper. Maybe we are talking about 6000 years lol

There are many ancient copper mines in the valley, some look like holes in the ground, others are caves hewn in stone ....

The King Solomon´s Pillars are the result of natural erosion, typical of red sandstone.

The moisture seeps into the fissures and causes the crumbling of the rock.

As the exterior layer of the stone is more resistant to the erosion so it creates this peculiar look of the pillars.