The reply from the tour operator indicated that the group will arrive at Masada at 11:00am. This means we would have to spend about 5 hours there on our own. Luggage is not a problem since we can either ask a guide (I don't know if he would be up at around 4am) or drop it off at the hotel at Dead Sea where we will be staying overnight.
They also mentioned that the group would be leaving the Dead Sea hotel at about 9am. I think we will go with the going to Masada from the Dead Sea hotel. We should be back to the hotel way before 9am to cath the group. Another benefit is we can have about 1.5 hours of extra sleep since we will not have to drive from Jerusalem.
Jun 30, 2012
Jun 28, 2012
Back to Masada
My dad gave me another idea on how to better arrange Masada trip to include sunrise and minimize the inconvinience: instead of going there from the Dead Sea hotel day after the tour visit, do it before and meet the tour group there. Searching the internet I found out the time for sunrize is around 6:30am. Google maps says we need to leave the hotel at 4:30am! That will be a tough day.
Pros: don't have to worry about meeting the tour group. The main point is how to catch up with the group.
Cons:
- Have to get up earlier on the day when we go to Masada. It starts in Jerusalem. So, it is further away.
- Luggage. Since we are going to a different hotel, I don't know what to do about it. Taking with us does not make sense, since we are planning hiking to the top. The only option is to see if we can leave it with the tour bus.
Just sent an email to travel guys. They should have an advice.
Pros: don't have to worry about meeting the tour group. The main point is how to catch up with the group.
Cons:
- Have to get up earlier on the day when we go to Masada. It starts in Jerusalem. So, it is further away.
- Luggage. Since we are going to a different hotel, I don't know what to do about it. Taking with us does not make sense, since we are planning hiking to the top. The only option is to see if we can leave it with the tour bus.
Just sent an email to travel guys. They should have an advice.
Jun 22, 2012
More Israel preparations
After logging in into gate1travel.com (site where we booked our Israel tour) I found out that the options that we wanted were not included. Price did not look right. All these talks and still something we missed. The options we wanted were on day 4 Illuminated Jerusalem with the dinner and on day 8 Full day Golan Heights with lunch. We figured these is the free time, so sounds like fun thing to do. Golan Heights option includes visiting a winery and doing some wine tasting!
I've sent an email to the Gate1 and few minutes later these options got added!!! Speedy service. We are good to go!
I've sent an email to the Gate1 and few minutes later these options got added!!! Speedy service. We are good to go!
Jun 21, 2012
Isreal preparations
Another thing that I thought I would have to investigate is communication. I know I can buy a pre-paid sim card there that would be cheaper to use then to use my current service provider. The issue at hand is that I can get a phone that uses regular sim or micro or small/newer sim. I don't know if they have micro pre-paid ones. I guess I still have time to do the research, but in worst case, I am going to have to bring 2 phones.
Jun 20, 2012
Dallas, getting to the airport
Since our flight to Dallas is from Midway and way too early to ask anybody to drive us, we will drive ourselves to the airport. That means I have to find a parking by Midway for 4 days. Midway garage is $29/day. Google "midway parking" shows big selection of parking garages with price ranging from about $10 to $25 per day. Nice compromise (distance from the airport vs price) is about $14 by Midway Park Ride & Fly. The total cost would be $56 which is a lot cheaper then a round trip by taxi from home. They will hold the car and will give us a ride to and from airport.
One more entry in tripit.com!
One more entry in tripit.com!
Jun 19, 2012
Israel, Part 2
Now, that the decision about the tour has been made, the rest of things begin to fall into places. The tour has a specific dates, so air travel needs to be booked appropriately.
There is no direct flight from Chicago to Tel Aviv. That means I had to figure out all the connections. The interesting point is that all the travel agents as well as airlines claim that one needs about 1.5 to 2 hours between flights. However, nobody mentions that the airline closes the doors 30 minutes prior the time of departure. Which means we only would have hour and an half. Also on the way there, if the first lag is not by El Al, getting on El Al will take longer since they have tighter security then any other airline in the world.
On the way back, we have to worry about going thru US customs and immigrations. If we go thru that in Chicago, there is no problem. But if we have to do it at the point of entry, we should have more then 2 hours. Since my daughter had unpleasant experience with it recently, I did not want to take any chances.
After prolong negotiations with the travel agent, we ended up with what I think is pretty decent arrangement:
Chicago->Zurich->Tel Aviv. 3 and a half hours layover in Zurich. Should be enough time.
Tel Aviv->Toronto->Chicago: 2 and a half hours layover in Toronto. I know for a fact that we will have to go thru US customs in Toronto, but 2.5 hours should be enough. I hope.
Travel time is perfect: leaving Chicago and Tel Aviv in the middle of the day! There was a possibility of leaving Tel Aviv at 2:00am local time. That would have been bad.
Last step is to update tripit.com and we are all set to go. Now, I can't wait.
One thing I should probably do is to contact a hotel at Dead Sea and see if they can help making arrangement for early morning trip to Masada (taxi is probably all we need, but I would feel better after talking to some local people)
There is no direct flight from Chicago to Tel Aviv. That means I had to figure out all the connections. The interesting point is that all the travel agents as well as airlines claim that one needs about 1.5 to 2 hours between flights. However, nobody mentions that the airline closes the doors 30 minutes prior the time of departure. Which means we only would have hour and an half. Also on the way there, if the first lag is not by El Al, getting on El Al will take longer since they have tighter security then any other airline in the world.
On the way back, we have to worry about going thru US customs and immigrations. If we go thru that in Chicago, there is no problem. But if we have to do it at the point of entry, we should have more then 2 hours. Since my daughter had unpleasant experience with it recently, I did not want to take any chances.
After prolong negotiations with the travel agent, we ended up with what I think is pretty decent arrangement:
Chicago->Zurich->Tel Aviv. 3 and a half hours layover in Zurich. Should be enough time.
Tel Aviv->Toronto->Chicago: 2 and a half hours layover in Toronto. I know for a fact that we will have to go thru US customs in Toronto, but 2.5 hours should be enough. I hope.
Travel time is perfect: leaving Chicago and Tel Aviv in the middle of the day! There was a possibility of leaving Tel Aviv at 2:00am local time. That would have been bad.
Last step is to update tripit.com and we are all set to go. Now, I can't wait.
One thing I should probably do is to contact a hotel at Dead Sea and see if they can help making arrangement for early morning trip to Masada (taxi is probably all we need, but I would feel better after talking to some local people)
Israel, Part 1
We finally decided to go to Israel. This trip has been on the back of our minds for a long time. Kids are old enough to be on their own for couple of weeks. Time to go!
Some decisions needed to be made:
Question: when?
Answer: not during the summer or winter. Summer is way too hot for sightseeing. Winter is too cold to go swimming outside. So, either fall or spring. We've decide in fall.
Question: for how long?
Answer: depends on the answers to the following questions, but we've decided that it should not be more then around 2 weeks.
Question: do it as part of the tour or wing it when there?
Answer: I've decided to do some research. I found out that Israeli Ministry of tourism has certification program for tour guides. There are thousands of certified guides out there. I took the easy route: get a tour. Tours include itinerary that are very similar among tour operators. They all visit similar places and include hotels accomodations. We had 2 requirements: 1) we wanted the tour to finish in Tel Aviv 2) we wanted to hike up the Masada and see the sunrise.
Majority of the tours end in Jerusalem, but there were some that ended in Tel Aviv, so that was not a problem.
The second request was a little more challenging: The problem is that all tours to Masada/Dead Sea start in Jerusalem, which means they arrive at Masada late morning, and they all take gondola to the top, no hiking. We found one tour: 11 days tour from Gate1travel.com that has a stay over night at one of the hotels at Dead sea. The thought is that we will wake up early enough in the morning, hike up to Masada to meet sunrise and be back to hotel before the breakfast. I am sure we will need to figure out few details, but this is as close to the goal as I can get.
Also this tour starts in Jerusalem and ends in Tel Aviv. So, we can stay in the same hotel after the tour is over!
The final decision: 11 days tour of Israel from gate1trave.com
Some decisions needed to be made:
Question: when?
Answer: not during the summer or winter. Summer is way too hot for sightseeing. Winter is too cold to go swimming outside. So, either fall or spring. We've decide in fall.
Question: for how long?
Answer: depends on the answers to the following questions, but we've decided that it should not be more then around 2 weeks.
Question: do it as part of the tour or wing it when there?
Answer: I've decided to do some research. I found out that Israeli Ministry of tourism has certification program for tour guides. There are thousands of certified guides out there. I took the easy route: get a tour. Tours include itinerary that are very similar among tour operators. They all visit similar places and include hotels accomodations. We had 2 requirements: 1) we wanted the tour to finish in Tel Aviv 2) we wanted to hike up the Masada and see the sunrise.
Majority of the tours end in Jerusalem, but there were some that ended in Tel Aviv, so that was not a problem.
The second request was a little more challenging: The problem is that all tours to Masada/Dead Sea start in Jerusalem, which means they arrive at Masada late morning, and they all take gondola to the top, no hiking. We found one tour: 11 days tour from Gate1travel.com that has a stay over night at one of the hotels at Dead sea. The thought is that we will wake up early enough in the morning, hike up to Masada to meet sunrise and be back to hotel before the breakfast. I am sure we will need to figure out few details, but this is as close to the goal as I can get.
Also this tour starts in Jerusalem and ends in Tel Aviv. So, we can stay in the same hotel after the tour is over!
The final decision: 11 days tour of Israel from gate1trave.com
Jun 18, 2012
Dallas
I don't know if this qualifies, but this is my (including family) first trip since I've started this blog, meaning we will get on the plane and will stay in a hotel. This trip is for 4 days to Dallas for US Junior Volleyball Nationals. Officially, this trip started few months ago.
Step one was registering for the hotel via THS (some organization that we must go thru to book the hotel). Basically, every team member says that they are going and THS books the appropriate number of rooms. I did check the price via other means (Expedia.com and the hotel's web site) and THS did have the best deal.
Step two was to decide if we wanted to drive or fly. Time vs Money. Time won and we've decided to fly. Going thru various web sites (expedia.com, travelocity.com, aa.com, southwest.com, kayak.com, etc) I found that kayak.com has a cool feature that sends the email every day with price of the travel. After few days, and figuring out that everybody except Southwest charges for luggage, I've decided to book tickets with Southwest. Unfortunately, our flight leaves early in the morning from Midway, meaning very little sleep.
Then, I tried to figure out how we are going to get from airport to hotel. There is a discount for shuttle, but they charge for each person the same amount. I found a site that can price a taxi. Taxi ended up being almost half the price! We will be taking a taxi.
The day of arrival will be the only day for site seeing. I don't know what we are going to do other then visit the place where Kennedy got shot.
Trip related sites
I thought I would share some travel related sites that I have been using:
tripit.com
This is the site that I use to keep all my travel arrangements. The good thing is that they know how to parse all the itineraries that I have sent there. Once I forward itinerary, they parse it and create or adjust a trip. I have not found an itinerary that they don't understand! Everything about the trip ends up in one place. They have an app for my phone, so I can always access my trip via the phone, so I have all reservation information available!
kayak.com
Just found out that if you put a search in there and register your email, it sends you an email with update prices of the trip.
expedia.com
I used this site for most of my trips before. They had pretty good prices.
southwest.com
That is the only site I found that sell tickets for southwest airline. The only airline that does not charge for the luggage.
aa.com
American Airline. I heard rumors that they are going to stop allowing on-line travel agencies to book the travel and people would have to go directly. So far, that's not true.
I'll posting more sites when I find something interesting.
tripit.com
This is the site that I use to keep all my travel arrangements. The good thing is that they know how to parse all the itineraries that I have sent there. Once I forward itinerary, they parse it and create or adjust a trip. I have not found an itinerary that they don't understand! Everything about the trip ends up in one place. They have an app for my phone, so I can always access my trip via the phone, so I have all reservation information available!
kayak.com
Just found out that if you put a search in there and register your email, it sends you an email with update prices of the trip.
expedia.com
I used this site for most of my trips before. They had pretty good prices.
southwest.com
That is the only site I found that sell tickets for southwest airline. The only airline that does not charge for the luggage.
aa.com
American Airline. I heard rumors that they are going to stop allowing on-line travel agencies to book the travel and people would have to go directly. So far, that's not true.
I'll posting more sites when I find something interesting.
Hello and welcome to the BD world travel.
This is my first try at blogging. I found a topic that I can blog about :) The frequency of entries will vary, since the blog is about my world travel or just general travel. I've been in small number of different countries and I finally decided to keep a blog about anything and everything that relates to my travel. Hopefully, I will start travel more then I did before. My plan for this is to describe what I went thru from the moment I decide to go somewhere (concept) to the arrival at my home after the trip. My goal is not to be an advice column, but to preserve and share my experience while traveling.
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