64 Best Sights in Haifa and the Northern Coast, Israel

Nahariya's public bathing facilities at Galei Galil Beach are ideal for families. Apart from the lovely beach, facilities include an Olympic-size outdoor pool (closed in winter), heated indoor pool, wading pool, playground, and clean changing rooms. In peak season, the beach has exercise classes early in the morning. Amenities: food and drink; lifeguards; parking (fee); showers; toilets. Best for: swimming.

Founded in 1949 by survivors of the German, Polish, and Lithuanian Jewish ghettos set up by the Nazis, kibbutz Lochamei Hageta'ot commemorates their compatriots who perished in the Holocaust at this museum. Exhibits include photographs documenting the Warsaw Ghetto and the uprising, and halls are devoted to different themes, among them Jewish communities before their destruction in the Holocaust; death camps; and deportations at the hands of the Nazis.

The adjacent Yad LaYeled (Children's Memorial) is dedicated to the memory of the 1½ million children who perished in the Holocaust. It's designed for young visitors, who can begin to comprehend the events of the Holocaust through a series of tableaux and images accompanied by recorded voices, allowing them to identify with individual victims without seeing shocking details. There is a small cafeteria on the premises.

Benches sit among palm trees and surround a large fountain at this lively central square with open-air cafés and restaurants that are crowded from morning until late into the evening. Netanya attracts droves of French visitors, and, in summer, their lilting tones float above the café au lait and croissants. Saturday nights are often enlivened by folk dancing, and the amphitheater hosts free concerts in summer and an arts-and-crafts fair on Friday morning.

This museum, on the southern edge of the Wadi Nisnas neighborhood, displays artwork from all over the world, dating from the mid-18th century to the present. It also serves as a special repository of contemporary Israeli art. Included are 20th-century graphics and contemporary paintings, sculptures, and photographs. The print collection is of special note, as are frequent solo exhibitions by young Israeli artists. The museum also houses an interactive children's wing.

Amid masses of trees and lush foliage in the Gan Ha'Em park is a seemingly happy collection of roaring lions and tigers, big brown bears, chattering monkeys, stripe-tailed lemurs, a placid camel, lots of snakes and reptiles, one croc, a kangaroo, and fierce-eyed eagles and owls—plus a bat cave and a waterbird pond. It's a hilly place, but a tram can take you up the steepest terrain. A small natural history museum and petting zoo complement the regular educational exhibits.

It's worth the trip to Haifa University to see this museum's archaeological treasures. At the summit of Mount Carmel, in the main campus tower (called Eshkol Tower), the museum has a collection that spans the millennia from the Chalcolithic era to the Roman and Byzantine periods, concentrating on "The People of Israel in Eretz Israel." The artifacts include religious altars and lamps, Bronze Age figurines, inscribed seals from the biblical period, and a 2,400-year-old ship. Featured prominently are finds from the excavations of Jerusalem's Temple Mount. A separate art wing displays a small collection of paintings, mostly impressionist works by Monet, Soutine, and Modigliani, among others. The roof observation deck, on the 27th floor, has spectacular views.

Netanya's most popular beach has a broad staircase that leads down to the waterfront. For fitness nuts there's a shaded exercise area with all sorts of equipment, volleyball nets, and a paved basketball court. You can rent kayaks and windsurfing gear in the summer. The beach is wheelchair accessible. There is also a café and two lifeguard stations. Amenities: food and drink; lifeguards; parking (fee); showers; toilets; water sports. Best for: swimming; windsurfing.

North of the Leonardo Hotel, and next to the Rambam Medical Center, the quiet Hof HaShaket has separate gender days: Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday for women; Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for men; Saturday for everyone. Amenities: food and drink; lifeguards; parking (fee); showers. Best for: solitude; swimming.

The largest and most popular beach in the area is the exceptionally well-kept Hof Shonit (translated as "Reef Beach"), with a refreshment stand and a restaurant, as well as restrooms and cold showers. In addition to the beach there is a water park with extreme slides for the kids (open only on Saturdays in-season) and adult and toddler swimming pools. Parking is NIS 15. Amenities: food and drink; lifeguards; parking (fee); showers; toilets; water sports. Best for: swimming.

On the village square is this museum dedicated to the art and life of one of the founders of the Dada movement. The Romanian-born Marcel Janco had already established a considerable professional reputation by the time he moved here in 1941. The museum houses a permanent collection of the artist's work in various media, reflecting Janco's 70-year output both in Europe and Israel. A 20-minute slideshow chronicles the life of the artist and the Dada movement, and the DadaLab offers hands-on activities for children. Don't miss the view from the roof.

In Venezia Square, in front of the port, is the two-tiered Inn of the Pillars. Before you visit this Ottoman khan—the largest of the four in Akko—and the Pisan Quarter beyond, take a stroll around the port, with its small flotilla of fishing boats, yachts, and sailboats. Then walk through the khan's gate beneath a square clock tower, built at the turn of the 20th century. The khan served vast numbers of merchants and travelers during Akko's golden age of commerce, in the late 18th century. The 32 pink-and-gray granite pillars that give it its name are compliments of Ahmed el-Jazzar's raids on Roman Caesarea. There was once a market at the center of the colonnaded courtyard.

This whitewashed building on Panorama Road is the house and studio where the expressionist painter Emmanuel Katz (1894–1962) lived and worked for the last four years of his life. Katz spent the 1920s in Paris, where he exhibited with a group of avant-garde Jewish artists from the École de Paris. As in the canvases of fellow members Marc Chagall and Chaim Soutine, a recurring theme in his work is the village life of Eastern European Jews. Besides Katz's paintings, drawings, and sculptures are the Ukrainian-born artist's collection of rugs, 17th-century antiques from Spain and Germany, and Judaica.

The beach at Mikhmoret, a moshav (small cooperative settlement) 7½ km (4½ miles) north of Netanya, is popular with swimmers as well as those who laze away the day under umbrellas. The huge dirt parking lot, which charges per car, is 1 km (½ mile) after the turnoff from Route 2. There are three lifeguard stations, a restaurant, café, and chair and umbrella rentals. This is a backpacker favorite, and there's a hostel on the beach. Amenities: food and drink; lifeguards; parking (fee); toilets; water sports. Best for: sunset; swimming.

This very worthwhile museum next to Kibbutz Nahsholim holds a rich collection of finds from nautical digs and excavations at nearby Tel Dor. It's in the partly restored former glass factory opened by Baron Edmond de Rothschild in 1891 to serve the wineries of Zichron Ya'akov. The sequence of peoples who settled, conquered, or passed through Dor—from the Canaanites to the Phoenicians to Napoléon and his forces—can be traced through these artifacts. Of particular interest is the bronze cannon that Napoléon's vanquished troops dumped into the sea during their retreat from Akko to Egypt in May 1799. An informative film in English illuminates the history of the ancient port city of Dor.

About 5,000 years of maritime history in the Mediterranean and Red Sea are told with model ships, ancient anchors, coins minted with nautical symbols, navigational instruments, and other artifacts. There are also intriguing underwater finds from nearby excavations and shipwrecks. The ancient-art collection is one of the finest in the country, comprising mostly Greek and Roman stone and marble sculpture, Egyptian textiles, Greek pottery, and encaustic grave portraits from Fayyum, in Lower Egypt. Particularly rare are the figures of fishermen from the Hellenistic period, as well as a 1st-century wooden boat rescued in the 1980s from the muddy bottom of the Sea of Galilee.

Housed in a landmark building (designed by Alexander Baerwald, a German Jewish architect, in the early 20th century) that was the original home of the Technion, Israel's MIT, this museum features excellent interactive exhibits sure to captivate children and adults alike. Explore the mysteries of DNA, the disorientations of mirrors and visual illusions, or the promises of green energy.

Nisan Cohen, a colorful and charming character who knows everything there is to know about old mechanical musical instruments, has amassed 150 music boxes, hand-operated automatic pianos, manivelles, antique gramophones on which to play his collection of old Yiddish records, and more antique musical marvels. Cohen is pleased to give you a guided tour and then treat you to a personal concert. His sense of humor and gift of the gab make for a touching and intriguing experience. Before the entrance to Ein Hod, watch for a brown wooden sign with yellow letters.

On a prominent corner stands the old synagogue, Ohel Ya'akov, built by Baron de Rothschild in 1886 to serve immigrants from Romania. It's only occasionally open to visitors, but it's worth strolling by.

Climbing the stone steps at the water's edge, you can walk along the sea walls at the Pisan Harbor, so named after an Italian commune here in Crusader times. Start at the café perched on high—a great lookout—and head west in the direction of the 18th-century Church of St. John. You end up at the southwestern extremity of Akko, next to the lighthouse. Head north along Haganah Street, which runs parallel to the crenellated western sea wall. After five minutes you reach the whitewashed, blue-trimmed Baha'i house (not open to the public), where the prophet of the Baha'i religion, Baha'u'llah, spent 12 years of his exile. His burial site is just north of Akko at the Baha'i Founder's Shrine and Gardens.

In Caesarea's villa area, you can't miss the two Spanish colonial–style buildings of the Ralli Museum, with their red-tile roofs and terraces. One of these dazzling white buildings houses an exhibit on the ancient city's history, and the second building, in a Moorish style, examines the golden age of Spanish Jewry in the Middle Ages. It's a pleasure to wander along the walls of the courtyard and gaze at the sculptures of various dignitaries such as Maimonides and Spinoza. Inside are paintings with biblical themes by European artists of the 16th to 18th centuries. Rotating exhibitions display contemporary Latin American art.

In the hills near Zichron Ya'akov, this sprawling garden is a fitting tribute to Baron Edmond de Rothschild. (Hanadiv means "the benefactor.") At its center is the dignified tomb where Rothschild and his wife Ada lie buried. A 20-minute film in the welcoming Visitors Pavilion tells of his legacy in Israel: the last screening on weekdays is at 3:30. Outside, curving paths frame rolling green lawns, abundant patches of flowers, carob trees, waving palms, and 42 rare plant species. Clearly marked trails lead to a 2,000-year old Roman farmhouse and a hidden spring. After all that legwork, the terraces of the on-site café beckon. A children's playground is set off to one side.

As you enter the Old City, climb the blue-railing stairway on your right for a stroll along the city walls. Walking to the right, you can see the stunted remains of the 12th-century walls built by the Crusaders, under whose brief rule—just less than two centuries—Akko flourished as never before or since. The indelible signs of the Crusaders, who made Akko the main port of their Christian empire, are much more evident inside the Old City.

The wall girding the northern part of the town was built by Ahmed el-Jazzar, the Pasha of Akko, who added these fortifications following his victory over Napoléon's army in 1799. With the help of the British fleet, el-Jazzar turned Napoléon's attempted conquest into a humiliating rout. Napoléon had dreamed of founding a new Eastern empire, thrusting northward from Akko to Turkey and then seizing India from Great Britain. His defeat at Akko hastened his retreat to France, thus changing the course of history. Walk around to the guard towers and up an incline just opposite; there's a view of the moat below and Haifa across the bay. Turn around and let your gaze settle on the exotic skyline of Old Akko, the sea green dome of the great mosque its dominating feature. Walk down the ramp, crossing the rather messy Moat Garden at the base of the walls; straight ahead is the Al-Jazzar Mosque.

Caesarea's Roman aqueduct frames a spacious beach with the dramatic backdrop of arches disappearing into the sand. There is no entrance fee but few amenities—no restaurants or promenade. The beach and swimming areas have been cleared of rocks and debris, but swimming outside the designated area is prohibited. Never swim unless the seasonal lifeguard is on duty. Amenities: lifeguards; parking (fee) Best for: sunset; walking.

Before you get in line for the steep two-minute ride on the Austrian-made cable car down to Rosh Hanikra's grottoes, take a moment to absorb the stunning view along the coast. Bring binoculars. Still clearly visible is the route of the railway line, now mostly a dirt road, built by the British through the hillside in 1943 to extend the Cairo–Tel Aviv–Haifa line to Beirut. (You are now much closer to Beirut than to Jerusalem.) After the descent, you can see the 12-minute audiovisual presentation called The Sea and the Cliff.

The incredible caves beneath the cliff have been carved out by relentless waves pounding away at the white chalky rock for millennia. Footpaths inside the cliff lead from one huge cave to another, while the sound of waves—and the squealing of fruit bats—echoes off the water-sprayed walls. Huge bursts of seawater plunge into pools at your feet (behind protective rails). It's slippery, so hang on.

Also known as "the boulevard," the seaside promenade extends north and south of the city for about 6 km (4 miles) with beautifully landscaped walkways that wind around the contours of the sandstone cliffs overlooking the sea; every angle affords a gorgeous view. It's dotted with pergola-shaded benches, wooden bridges, colorful playground areas, and waving palm trees. An elevator at the center of the promenade eases the climb up and down the seaside cliff.

An elevator takes you down the sandstone cliff to Netanya's main beach, which has the largest stretch of sand in the area. In addition, a paved road allows walkers and wheelchair users access almost to the shoreline, and the lifeguard stand has ultralight wheelchairs for use that can go right into the water. The beach also has two cafés and two drink kiosks with seating inside and out, as well as a parking lot just south of Ha'atzmaut Square. Fridays are filled with salsa and folk dancing. Amenities: food and drink; lifeguards; parking (fee); showers; toilets; water sports. Best for: partiers; swimming.

At this outdoor market, stalls heaped with fresh produce and seafood alternate with specialty stores: a pastry shop with exotic Middle Eastern delicacies; a spice shop filled with Eastern flavors and aromas; a bakery with steaming fresh pita. You often see fishermen sitting on doorsteps, intently repairing their lines and nets to the sounds of Arabic music blaring from the open windows above. The loosely defined area twists and turns through the center of the Old City, but Marco Polo Street is a good place to begin your exploration.

Israel's top university for science and technology, the 300-acre Israeli Institute of Technology is highly fertile ground for cutting-edge research in such fields as engineering, medicine, architecture, and computer science. Founded in 1912, it is the country's oldest university and a key to Israel's reputation and success as a "start-up nation" of innovators. The Coler-California Visitors Center has a virtual tour of the institute and multimedia touch-screen videos.

Established in 1957 by renowned collector Felix Tikotin, this graceful venue on the crest of Mount Carmel adheres to the Japanese tradition of displaying beautiful objects in harmony with the season, so exhibits change every three months. The Japanese atmosphere, created in part by sliding doors and partitions of wood and paper, enhances a display of scrolls, screens, pottery and porcelain, lacquer and metalwork, paintings from several schools, and fresh-flower arrangements. The library houses some 3,000 volumes related to Japanese art.

One of the country's most esteemed wineries is set amid hills and valleys. The Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay of this premier label are among the best in Israel, with vines planted here 120 years ago. At the country-style visitor center, you can pair a French Valrhona chocolate with a Tishbi wine, or enjoy breakfast, brunch, or lunch under the grapevines in the courtyard. In addition to wine, you can purchase local cheeses, olive oil, honey, and wine jellies at the shop. Call ahead to arrange a one-hour tour, which includes tastings and a visit to the old alembic distillery, where their prized brandy is made. It's about 3 km (1½ miles) north of Benyamina.