Geek Tiyul: PICZ Goes North

Going on tiyul (trip) to the north is something that Israelis love to do, as they visit beautiful scenery, go on picturesque hikes and dip their city toes into clear, refreshing grottoes. It's a welcome respite from the day-to-day life of work, eat, sleep, start over.

On Monday, a group of intrepid Zionist innovators left their pied a terre in the somewhat-remote Jerusalem neighborhood of Arnona and headed north for a slightly different type of tiyul: infused with the spirit of innovation, the young group of 20-somethings were on a pilgrimage to a different type of holy site, where new ideas find life and search engines reign supreme.

First stop was what I called a "hikelet," a small hike along a nature path that ended at a grotto, where pasty computer-addicted youngsters stripped off as much clothing as they were comfortable and waded into the refreshing waters. After this relaxing start, they took some group pictures and photos of the beautiful scenery, before heading to the first real stop of the day: Tefen Industrial Park's Open Museum, where they visited one of the companies that had been incubated in the park, Savta Jamila's soap company.

Then the group headed slightly south to Haifa, to visit the Golden Temple of Google and pay homage to colorful cafeteria/engineer play rooms, while liquidating the company of its bounty of holy, free snacks and developing a group case of job envy. Even a visit to the bathroom was different at Google: the "Testing on the Toilet" program (no, I'm not making that up) provides specific bathroom reading to employees, posting it on the inside of bathroom stall doors so that no moment is, um, wasted.

Back on the bus, they headed north to Rosh Hanikra, close to the border of Lebanon, visiting the home of a friend of the PresenTense Institute and enjoying a lovely reception and views of the ocean before heading back to Jerusalem.

But pictures are worth a thousand Google searches. (OK, they're not. But you get the point.) And therefore, I present the Geek Tiyul: A day in pictures.