Mountain biking in Israel — a visitor’s guide

Rochvim Kavuh (“regular riders”) is a Hebrew database of 1013 mountain-bike trails across Israel, 1013 of them with a GPX file. The pages are in Hebrew; the maps, numbers and files are not. This page is the English way in.

Using the site without Hebrew

Every track page has the same layout: distance, climbing and difficulty at the top, then a map and an elevation profile. The buttons you need:

⬇️ הורדת קובץ GPX — download the GPX file (free Google sign-in).
🧭 ניווט לתחילת המסלול — open Google Maps directions to the trailhead.
📥 שמירה לשטח — save the page and route on your phone for areas with no signal. The 🧭 שטח map tab then shows the route and your GPS position, offline.
מפה רגילה · מפת Mapeak · תלת-ממד — standard map, Mapeak map, 3D terrain view.

Difficulty labels: קל easy, בינוני moderate, קשה hard, אתגרי expert. Your browser’s built-in translation works on the text parts of the pages.

For a whole riding day near where you are staying, the day planner combines catalogue trails into 522 ready-made days with one GPX each. Choose your starting point on the map, a length, and — for a trip — how many days (כמה ימים): it then plans several days from the same base without repeating a trail.

Regions

Region	Trails
The North — Galilee, Golan and the Sea of Galilee	274
Center and the Judean Foothills	200
Carmel, Menashe Heights and the valleys	123
The South — Negev and the craters	123
Jerusalem and the Judean Hills	92
The Sharon	74
Arava and Eilat	83
Judean Desert and the Dead Sea	44

Each region page (in Hebrew) lists its trails on a map, grouped by sub-area.

Trail types

The words you will see on every card: סינגל singletrack, a trail one bike wide (293 trails); דאבל (דרכי שטח) a dirt road a car wide (59); מעורב mixed, singletrack sections linked by dirt roads — the most common type (602); שביל אופניים מוסדר a paved or built bike path (26). “Singletrack” is not a difficulty: plenty are easy. More in the Hebrew singletrack guide.

Seasons, rain and mud

The desert south — the Negev, the Arava and Eilat — is a winter destination: November to March. In summer it has no shade and no water for tens of kilometres, and it is genuinely dangerous. The north and the hills ride all year, best from autumn to spring.

Rain changes everything for a few days. Riding wet trails cuts ruts that become drainage channels in the next rain; most damage to Israeli singletrack happens in the days after rain, not during it. If the trail sticks to your tyres, turn back. The order in which regions dry out:

Fast: the Negev, the Arava, the Judean Desert and the Negev Highlands — a day after light rain. The exception is wadis: rain tens of kilometres away can cause a flash flood where it did not rain at all.
Medium: rocky and sandstone soils — Carmel, Menashe Heights, the Jerusalem Hills and the Galilee — two to three days; forest sections stay damp longer.
Slow: loess and marl — the western Negev, parts of the Judean Foothills, and the Golan basalt — three to five days after real rain.

The after-rain page (in Hebrew) ranks the regions live from the last seven days of rain and the soil type; the table and region names are easy to follow with a browser translation. Track pages also carry riders’ condition reports.

Yom Kippur

Once a year the roads empty and the country rides. No law forbids cycling on Yom Kippur — it is a custom, not legislation — but traffic law still applies and the police enforce it, also on cyclists. The police ask people to stay off highways and intercity roads and ride only on urban roads: the roads look empty, but emergency vehicles drive them at full speed and expect no one. It is also the day with the most cycling injuries: Magen David Adom reported 295 injured on bicycles, scooters and skates on Yom Kippur 2025, mostly children and teenagers on electric bikes. More in the Hebrew guide.

GPX files on your device

Phone: open the downloaded file with OsmAnd (offline topo maps — what matters in the desert), Locus Map, Gaia GPS, Komoot or Strava.
Garmin: Garmin Connect → Courses → Import, then sync; or copy the file to the device’s NewFiles folder over USB.
Wahoo: the Wahoo app → Routes → Add, or sync from Komoot or Strava.

A GPX file is a line, not turn-by-turn directions. Look at the elevation profile and the map before you set out. The Hebrew GPX guide has the details.

Frequently asked questions

Is the website available in English?

The track pages are in Hebrew, but the data is universal: distance, climbing, a map and a GPX file for 1013 of the 1013 tracks. This guide explains which buttons to look for.

Do I need an account to download GPX files?

A free sign-in with a Google account. It exists only to stop bulk scraping of the database; there is no fee and no newsletter.

Where can I ride after rain?

Where the ground drains fast: the Negev, the Arava, the Judean Desert and the Negev Highlands, then rocky and sandy soils. Worst are loess and marl — the western Negev, parts of the Judean Foothills and the Golan basalt — which stay muddy for three to five days after real rain.

Can I cycle on Yom Kippur?

Yes. No law in Israel forbids driving or cycling on Yom Kippur; it is a custom. Traffic law still applies and is enforced, and the police recommend staying off highways and intercity roads and riding only on urban roads.