Once the altar has been rebuilt, the people begin making plans to work on the foundations of the temple. They hire all the necessary workers and make sure that have the needed goods. It will take some time for the wood from Lebanon to arrive in Jerusalem. It needs to be sent from one of the harbours in Tyre or Sidon to Joppa. Joppa was the harbour/port which was the closest to the city of Jerusalem.
7 So they gave money to the masons and the carpenters, and food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and the Tyrians to bring cedar trees from Lebanon to the sea, to Joppa, according to the grant that they had from Cyrus king of Persia.