Jerusalem is a great place for people who love to aimlessly wander around, especially in the Old City.
This bustling microtropolis of stalls, temples and houses is probably what Venice used to be like when locals actually lived there, and the lack of clear boundaries between the Jewish, Muslim, Christian and Armenian quarters keeps things interesting, as silver menorah candles abruptly give way to trinkets depicting Our Saviour.
I didn't visit the Vatican while in Italy, but even so, I can safely say that Old Jerusalem's Christian Quarter is much more the sort of tourist attraction He would have wanted. Hopefully the various Messiah Tours criss-crossing significant areas of this holy nation are similarly low-key.
Do the Ramparts Walk
If you get lost, scared and confused during your aimless wandering, rather than converting to the nearest convenient faith and praying for a miracle, you can Do the Rampart Walk - something I'm also trying to popularise as a dance move, which requires wearing ill-equipped canvas shoes because your sturdier ones currently bloody stink, and every so often slipping on the perilous stone steps. You'll all be doing it by the spring.
I have to hand it to Jerusalem - they haven't allowed health and safety considerations or disabled access to spoil this historical site. Actually, very little seems to have changed at all over the last couple of centuries, since the fortress went through its last phase of destruction and rebuilding. It's still used as a centre of defence and law enforcement, as the prevalence of devil's rope will threateningly inform you, and even the Ottoman-built police stable complete with horses has stubbornly refused to notice that it isn't 1876 anymore. I admire it for that.
The Rampart Walk starts at Jaffa Gate and costs 16 shekels. Free stuff fans may want to consider entering through the subterranean chambers of the fortress, where it meets the real world at locations like Batei Machase, and climbing the life-threatening steps that will get you onto the ramparts as long as you aren't disabled.
Even if you aren't physically handicapped, you may still have to be mentally ill, if you really think saving the equivalent of £2.80 is worth risking a run-in with Israeli authorities. My favourite authorities in the world.
