between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv

Today will go down in Wilson family lore. 

When I booked this trip, I used an excellent travel agent from Israel.  Her company is called Tova Wald (her name ).  I wasn’t so sure about landing in Egypt and figuring it out and I also wasn’t so excited about the time and effort it was going to take me to make sure we did everything we wanted and deal with visas and feel safe.  So in the end, I opted for an agent.  I was pretty honest about how we usually travel and what we like.  We went back and forth a few times on what I wanted the trips itinerary to look like.  I know that coming to this area of the country which is chocked with history, friction and very religious people should be taken in so you can understand what you are seeing and experiencing.  You have to understand how Israel came to be and what happened in the Golan Heights and how close all these countries are and why territories are so important.  I get it but I should have stuck to my gut which is just do Egypt, Petra, Jerusalem (3 days is fine) and then the rest in Tel Aviv where we will have the best time.  Instead, I was swayed to go with a few extra things here and there which just created frustration among the five of us.

Today we got up and drove to the Golan Heights driving along the scenic Jordan River.  It took us three hours.  Once we got there we had a quick lunch and then took a jeep ride up to the Golan Heights where you can see Lebanon and Syria and understand what happened in the six day war.  Afterward, we were going to go to a winery but decided to stop by Safed, an ancient artists colony.  We were all hating life.  Jessica said, why don’t we just go to Tel Aviv now?  And so…we did.

We went back to the hotel, got our stuff (luckily they only had our bags and we had not checked in yet) and drove to Tel Aviv.  We were able to get an extra night of rooms.  Now we are here and so happy.  We will spend three whole days here exploring, eating, shopping, seeing art, maybe buying art and really getting to know the city we all want to know. 

Lessons learned for me.  No need to do it all.  Do what works for us not for the rest of the world.  We are urban rats and love getting to know a city.  That is what we love to do when we travel.  Stick with your gut.