40km (25 miles) N of Tel Aviv; 49km (30 miles) S of Haifa; 16km (10 miles) N of Netanya. This is one of my favorite places in Israel. It's relatively quiet and has beautiful beaches, dramatic ruins beside the sea, a luxury hotel, and an 18-hole golf course. Caesarea's beautiful excavations give you a real feeling for the tide of history that has washed Israel's shores. Located about a third of the way from Tel Aviv to Haifa, behind a cluster of banana groves, Caesarea is the spectacular city of Herod the Great (37 B.C.-4 B.C.), who set out to construct a port to rival Alexandria. It was Herod who enlarged and beautified the town, adding a spectacular harbor and naming the city in honor of his Roman suzerain and benefactor, Augustus Caesar. By the time of Herod's death, Caesarea was one of the grandest port cities of the eastern Mediterranean. Caesarea was the headquarters of Roman rule in Israel, and figures prominently in the story of the apostle Paul: He was warned not to go to Jerusalem; he went anyway, returning to Caesarea in chains to stand trial for heresy. The Jews increasingly resented the Roman domination of their land, and tensions came to a head in A.D. 60-70 when pogroms against the Jewish population began, culminating in the brutal massacre of 2,000 Jews in the Caesarea amphitheater. All Judea subsequently rose in revolt and the Romans retaliated by destroying Jerusalem in A.D. 70 and conquering Masada in A.D. 73. In A.D. 132, the rebellion of Bar
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