Ambassador Hotel Jerusalem

We just arrived in Jerusalem. Started off in Tel Aviv with its high rise hotels along the Mediterranean coast and high rise core of office buildings. Good highways with LA type traffic. No problem with food and water everywhere here. Hotels are all kosher so breakfast buffet has lots of eggs and dairy but no meat of any kind--don't mix dairy and meat. Lunch and dinners start off with "mezze"--salad type appetizers--followed by grilled meat(chicken or beef) or fish--the two times we had fish i...

Well, today is my turn to do the blog. There is free internet at this small hotel but only two computers so very busy in the evenings and bob gave up. We will be staying for 4 nights in jerusalem - wonderful to not have to move. This morning, we first went to the mount of olives for an overview of the old city of jerusalem (walled part dating back over 4000 years). It had rained overnight so it was a little chilly but very fresh with clearing skies. We walked down the mt. of olives to the gar...

Hi everyone, This will be a catch up blog. I finally got my sleep patterns set so i dont fall asleep in the afternoon for 10 hours. Interesting facts about Israel: It is a small country, less than the size of the state of New Jersey with a population of about 3 million i believe. Jerusalem in the largest city, 675,000, Tel aviv next at 350,000 and Haifa next at about 200,000. Jewish settlers originally began to come to israel in the early 1900s with the zionist movement (theodore hertlz - spe...

Wonderful day Friday. Went to the Old City of Jerusalem and visited the Mount of Olives and the garden of gethsemane where there is a large church and small garden of olive trees both of which are outside the walls of the old city. Then into the city to trace the Via Delarosa (way of the cross) where there are small plaques for the location of each station. Quite an uphill climb through narrow cobblestone streets--surprised at the number of vendor stalls along the way--to the crucifixion site...

Today is Monday and we are leaving for the Dead Sea but first I will back track and fill in from the previous days. As Bob said in his blog the other day, Sat. night we met with a young Palestinian woman, 25 years old, who is a journalist and TV producer and very "political" as she said. It was fascinating to hear her side of the story. She was very passionate about the plight of the Palestinians and Betty, our guide, could not restrain herself and started to argue back with her until our gro...