Southern Red returns, and in a big way: a guide to the 2022 Anemone Festival
The good rain of January has done its thing, and the anemones are already blooming in the northern Negev in perfect coordination with the "South Red" festival that will take place in February for 4 weekends. And this year - the live performances are back, To you at the Anemone Festival 2022
Ziv Reinstein
27/01/2022
Thursday, 27 January 2022, 07:46 Updated: 08:23
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The Anemones Are Already Here, "South Red 2022" (Photo: Ziv Reinstein, Editing: Nir Chen)
Great rains have fallen so far in January this year, and this is an excellent preparation for anemones that are already blooming in the northern Negev and mark the arrival of the "South Red 2022" festival that will take place every February.
This is the 17th year that the Red Festival has taken place, and with the corona disease that comes up every day - the best insulation is in the open.
For four weekends (February 28-1, 2022) the Anemone Festival will be held, but if you too are in isolation like most parents and children in the country - here is a perfect tip to avoid traffic jams on Saturdays and also people - come for a walk in the middle of the week!
After two difficult years, including corona, closures, and quite a few fires that the area experienced from the neighbors' incendiary balloons, this year "South Red" returns at its peak so that the live performances that were not last year were returned (watch Hava Alberstein, Marina Maximilian, Tislam and more).
The anemone march (over five days) will also take place in capsules and pre-registration.
Finally, this is also the place to thank Livnat Ginzburg, director of the Shikma-Besor tourism association (together with Liora Sela David), who worked to promote the area and the festival from day one and go on a new path, and also to welcome the new director Doron Ashten and wish her success.
Here are some of the special places and people waiting for you in the red month.
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This is how you are photographed with the anemones without trampling them.
A lovable traveler in the northern Negev (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
There are many flowering centers, do not just crowd the Shokeda Forest and Barry.
Anemones in Beer Sage (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
The queen of crates
Picnic baskets are apparently the thing most identified with the northern Negev after the anemones. There is almost no one who does not come to the area and immediately equips himself with a basket of good cheeses, fresh breads, some quiche and squeezed lemonade wrapped in a checkered tablecloth, as if we were "Heidi the Mountain Girl" skipping the green slopes of "Little House in the Arava".
The variety is great, so this time they met the "Queen of the Crates", so at least calls herself Tohar Sharabi from Moshav Betha, who about two years ago opened her own picnic crates business after a personal crisis in her life. The crate and its contents are prepared entirely at home by Purity in collaboration with women's businesses in the area, for example Kaunas which is the flagship pastry and combined with leeks, garlic confit and olives from her and her husband’s farm. You will also find shakshuka, burgul salad, orange juice, cheeses, focaccia and more. This is a perfect and beautiful box, just worth replacing the disposable plastic utensils, but Purity says she's on it.
Price:
NIS 250 to 500 for a box (for 8-6 people), and the wooden box stays with you.
Talk to her:
054-7517548 (not on Saturday).
And also in peace.
"Crate from the South", Tohar Sharabi's picnic basket (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
This is "Home Immediately".
Purity prepares everything at home (Photo: Omar Harpaz)
Not only the anemones are red
Red anemones are nice and for them we are here, but not only are they red these days.
In Moshav Tekuma is Farm 77, where red strawberries grow in the air and are ready to be harvested.
The farm, which has been owned by the Trabelsi family for 30 years, hosts families and groups who want to experience picking of special crops, such as pineapple, strawberry, raspberry, banana, blueberry and of course strawberry, all its fruit and season.
Now, for example, you can pick strawberries and raspberries (which are already finished) and you can eat as much as you want when you pick.
Beyond that, you can get on the tractor cart to travel around the farm and on Fridays there are food stalls, an inflatable facility and a sale of the produce.
Price:
NIS 35 for strawberry picking, an additional NIS 15 for a tractor ride.
Talk to them:
08-9934237 and on the website.
Just go through and pick and eat.
Strawberries on Farm 77 in Moshav Tekuma (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
The air does him good.
Strawberry in Farm 77 (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
The garden that is not watered
And from crops in the air - to something with more feet on the ground, or rather plants that reflect the phrase "and the Negev will still be in bloom".
Meet "Green Point" - a botanical garden in Kibbutz Nir Oz - which is actually the only research garden in the country with a foundation for sustainable ecological gardening, all thanks to the vision of Ran Fauker, a graduate of the Kadouri Agricultural School, who became a gardener.
The garden is a non-profit funded by the Ministry of Agriculture and Village and Kibbutz Nick Oz, whose goal is to research the plant and spread the knowledge. "My philosophy is that I am lazy and stingy and what should not be done is not done," he explains. This made the garden economical and its gardeners use only 50 percent of the water recommended by the Ministry of Agriculture.
Inside the kibbutz there are 30 dunams of a botanical garden and another 90 dunams outside it.
For example, you can book a guided tour and get explanations about two impressive Bengali ficus trees, Sharan calls them "twins", and were planted in the 1970s.
Also, on the main lawn, the kibbutz members planted 10 different types of grass and checked the water consumption of each type (it turns out that they all consume the same amount).
Price:
NIS 30 for a guided tour (but it is also possible to tour independently by appointment).
Talk to them:
054-7916602 and on the website.
One of the "twins".
Bengali ficus at the Nir Oz Botanical Garden (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
The trees receive 50% of the recommended water, and still survive (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
Happening "Eat as much as you can"
The culinary options in the northern Negev take up more volume over the years, but on Saturdays many of the places are closed due to kosher. And among us, even tourists from the area came to rest a bit on the day of rest. Therefore, a meal at Beit Livneh in Moshav Ein HaBesor is a great solution, since the house is open (literally) to travelers all week (by appointment, of course).
The house was built by Nehemiah and Nira Livneh, who lived in the town of Dikla in Sinai, and when it was evacuated, they moved to Ein HaBesor. In their home, the spacious "Birch House," they have been hosting meals by appointment for 13 years. Today, their son Tomer, one of the owners of the "Sargos" restaurant in Tel Aviv and the "Wolfnights" chain, returned after 19 years in the big city and in New York to cook in his childhood seat. At the festival, Tomer and his family will offer a "eating as much as you can" meat happening, where meat is smoked, combined with a variety of salads and vegetarian dishes, of course.
Price:
NIS 180 per person, NIS 110 for a child up to the age of 12, and there will be a children's menu - NIS 60 per child.
Talk to them:
052-3670002 (by appointment) and in peace.
An open house for food.
Birch house in Moshav Ein HaBesor (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
Open a table.
The meal will be served in the beautiful courtyard of the house (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
Chef Tomer Livneh and some of the delicacies he will prepare at the festival (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
A product that is jojoba in every home
And from the care of the abdomen to the care of the face and the rest of the body.
Kibbutz Hatzerim ("only 5 minutes from Be'er Sheva") has a nice aircraft museum, but the whole kibbutz thanks to the decision made in 1990, which is to plant plantations of a Mexican plant called jojoba, because they did not want something that needed a lot of water.
These are the green bushes you see on Route 40 heading south and look like orchards growing golden apples - but in fact they grow a different gold.
The oil that comes from the jojoba fruit is used in the global cosmetics industry, for example in L'Oreal, Johnson & Johnson, Estee Lauder and other reputable companies, and it basically replaces the whale fat that has been used in the past in cosmetics (and good for that).
Yards have developed their own method (and varieties) for growing and producing oil and they market a third of the global amount - about a thousand tons a year and carry 10,000 acres of this golden gold.
It is interesting to know, that the picking of the jojoba is called harvest and is done by mechanical combing of the leaves, not shaken like an olive.
On the weekends of the festival, you can enjoy a film about the kibbutz and its history, which also includes an explanation of the local Netafim company, which produces 12 billion drippers a year
worldwide
.
, By registering on the website,
talk to them:
052-5016519.
The Mexican plant was planted in the 90s and today "grows" gold.
Jojoba Shrubs in the Yards (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
This is what the jojoba fruit from which the oil is produced looks like (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
And here's the golden gold that comes out of it.
Jojoba oil (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
Fill your hands with hamra
Anemones are not allowed to be picked, but for those who prepare anemones in one of the art workshops at the festival, to prepare with a suitable container.
For this purpose, they went to the ceramics studio of Yael Hayun Cunningfeld - a potter who fell in love with the profession in Japan and studied with a master there for three years.
After working in Tel Aviv for a while, she moved to Moshav Nir Akiva 23 years ago and opened "Hamra" - a studio for pottery and art workshops in clay.
"I fell in love with this structure," she says as she sits over wheels and clay in her hand as the creative hand, with her desire expanding and her desire shortening.
As part of the festival, Yael will hold daily pottery workshops, but for those who want to go deeper, they can also come beyond the festival days for one-time or weekly workshops.
Price:
NIS 80 per person per workshop.
Talk to her:
054-6344081 and on the website.
Yael Hayun Kningsfeld demonstrates how to make clay vessels (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
Hamra Studio in Moshav Nir Akiva (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
What they create - take home, of course (Photo: Walla !, Ziv Reinstein)
Some things you did not know about "Red South"
During the month of the festival, about half a million people come to the "Red South".
This is the 17th year, as mentioned, of the festival created to support local businesses.
On February 15, flocks of sheep and goats from the Bedouin neighbors will graze in the open, in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs and the regional councils, who will eat weeds and on the other hand fertilize with their rolls the soil for next year's anemones.
An opportunity to enjoy this look as well.
Barry Forest has undergone not a slight trauma in the last two years as a result of the kite burning, and is in rehabilitation but there is not bad growth.
You don't have to be crammed into Shokeda Forest, Bad Parking and Barry to see anemones.
Try the "Vermolen parking lot", for example.
This year also saw the opening of the northern Besor road which passed by car, try to walk in it as well.
This year she is a member of the "Negev Ecology" festival - a large recycling company that recycles all types of waste.
In the area you will find green, orange tin and a recyclable bottle cage, please use them as required.
The semolina will be taken to a new factory set up at the Dudaim site and the packaging will be recycled, and the organic food will be turned into compost.
Get to know the free "Matrongev" app, which gives all the information about the northern Negev and what to do in it.
More details about the festival and everything you need on the
"South Red 2022" website
.
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