Arriving in Tel Aviv

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Trip Start Nov 13, 2008 Trip End Dec 15, 2008 Next
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  Tel Aviv, Israel
Sunday, November 16, 2008

Bob and I arrived safely in Tel Aviv yesterday. We flew separately on different airlines using frequent flier miles. He went from LAX to NY and then on to Tel Aviv on El Al which is the national airline of Israel. They supposedly have the best security in the world, for good reason. As he was waiting at the check in desk in NY, a man came up to him and interrogated him about why he was going, when he got his ticket, where he was staying. The man wrote everything down in a notebook and then stamped the back of his passport with a sign that said F3 (???). I guess he was OK because they let him on the plane but I reminded him about that unpaid parking ticket in Edinburgh, Scotland 30 years ago - probably the one illegal act he has committed in his entire life.

They were 1 & 1/2 hours late leaving NY so were late arriving in Tel Aviv on Friday close to 4 pm. When they were still taxiing to the docking station, he noticed several men, obviously orthodox Jews dressed in black with beards, got up and began getting their luggage down. No one said anything to them. Then , the pilot came on and made an announcement in both Hebrew and English asking that everyone stay in their seats when they got to the docking station so that these few orthodox men could get off the plane first. Apparently, the Jewish sabbath starts in the early evening on Friday and the orthodox men had to get home before dark which was only a few hours away because they are not allowed to even drive in night. Interesting.

My flight was uneventful except that i almost missed the plane to England in San Francisco because my plane was late leaving LAX. I had only 20 minutes to literally run through the airport to the international terminal. I could hear them announcing my name over the loud speaker saying that the doors were closing but I made it, drenched in sweat. They shut the door as soon as I arrived. I had a 5 hour layover in London, then went on to Tel Aviv, 5 more hours.

Tel Aviv is a very modern city, many skyscapers. Our hotel is basic but in a good location. We walked to a fish restaurant several blocks away for dinner. I arrived about 6:30 pm. Bob arrived a few hours earlier. Tel Aviv is very secular. Even though it was the Jewish Sabbath, Fri. night, many restaurants were open and many people about. In Jerusalem, apparently everything shuts down from Fri. night to Sat. night. No cooking is allowed on the Sabbath - only food that has been prepared before hand can be served. The restaurant was in Frommers and was cute and very popular - sort of a glassed in side walk cafe. I think we were the oldest people there and the only non-israelis. Lots of young people.

Funny note: There was a very stern looking man at the front door who at first would not let us go in - he kept pointing to my purse and then pulled his jacket back to reveal a VERY LARGE gun. I finally figured out that he wanted to search my purse which he did and then let us in. There was no menu in English only Hebrew (very common - we both expected more English spoken and written) but several of the waitresses spoke English so helped us order. First, they serve a large (about 12 small dishes or so) selection of appetizers called "mezze" which are various pickled vegetables, hummus, herring (yuck), salads, etc., also a wonderful white dip which was like a taramasolata from Greek which is caviar, yoghurt and spices - very salty and very good. I don't know the name. We had grilled sea bass which was really good.

Sat. breakfast at the hotel was really good - as it was still the Sabbath, no food could be prepared fresh but they had a wonderful selection of salads, cheeses, fruits, breads, etc. It was a beautiful day so we walked a few blocks away to the beach area of Tel Aviv Old Port. This was the original port in Tel Aviv which was recently rennovated into a fabulous area with a huge wooden board walk with lots and lots of side walk cafes, shops. Since it was Saturday, it was very crowded with people, all biking, skating, and families picnicing and sitting in the cafes overlooking the ocean. It reminded me of the Greek islands. The cafes were all outside, most with very comfortable padded chairs and sofas with lots of people just eating, drinking and people watching. The boardwalk extended about a mile down the beach. We spent about 4 hours just walking, sitting, drinking, and had a wonderful ice cream . The weather was perfect - probably close to 80 with beautiful blue sky, slight breeze. Such a relaxing day to start our trip.

We then walked back to the hotel, stopping at a local market for water (although you can drink the water here), various cheeses and homemade hummus and flat breads which we snacked on for lunch. We are on the 9th floor here and can see the ocean to the side.

We both crashed in the afternoon but met the rest of the group for dinner about 7 in the hotel. There are 11 of us, most of the others had gone on a pretrip to Jordan (I went there when we were in Egypt). One woman is apparently missing (no one knows). A funny thing, they had Bob listed twice on the roster so the hotel kept insisting that we had TWO rooms. We told them we did not need two rooms but Bob said that if I keep snoring, he is going to take them up on that. The rest of the group said that they were all trying to figure out our arrangement. We get a list of other people on the tour and there were two Robert Bellolis and one Shirley Belloli. Everyone had a different explanation, some of them quite funny.

Dinner in the hotel tonight was quite good, great salads, cheeses, fish, chicken and a very good beef. It is now about 5 am. We are still not on any good sleeping schedule. I finally got up about 3 am and decided to come down and do the travel blog. Tomorrow, or i really should say today, is going to be long. We leave at about 8:30, come back for a few hours in the late afternoon and out again for dinner. Like they say in the brochures, this is ADVENTURE travel and not a vacation.

All for now. Bob is sleeping so this is just from me.

Tel Aviv Mom

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