Bus arrived at 7:30AM, took us to a collecting area, we had an excellent guide Amir, very knowledgeable, open minded & ready to answer all types of questions. We stopped on the way to get Coffee, arrived in Jerusalem around 9:00AM .. We had a view of the city from over the mountain. Then went to the Lamentation wall, the Via Dolorosa, the church of the Holy Sepulcher, it was impossible to enter Jesus's tomb because of the long queue. Left to the bus at 12:15PM to go to Bethlehem. There we were guided to a restaurant to have lunch (Costs around 16$) I had my lunch with me, I just took a drink. We went a walking distance to the Church of Nativity, visited inside with another guide Martin. Before leaving Bethlehem we stopped by a gift shop. Then trip back to Tel Aviv, we arrived at around 5:15PM My next visit will be on my own, there is still a thousand of other sites in Jerusalem that you can never see in a guided tour. A new train takes you directly from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

All in all a great tour with a reliable tour guide and a good price-performance ratio. Highlights were of course the sunrise at Masada and Ein Gedi with it's animals and the waterfal. Things to mind: - The climb at Masada is really exhausting. The cable car starts at 8am,, so you have to walk. If your old or not that sporty, it is possible, that you are not in time in Masada for the sunrise. - We don't know why everybody's talking about the dead sea and how wonderful it is. You feel like a dead fish in (too) salty, oily, nearly boiling water. If you make the mistake to put finger in your eyes, you feeling the pains of your life and after 30 minutes lying at the "beach" (more like mud desert) you sweating like hell. You can say, that you were at the lowest point at the earth, maybe that's the experience. But, like I said: The tour was all in all a great adventure!

Masada is breathtaking, the place itself, the view, the history of the region, the Building of the fortress and the history of the famous rebellion... Everything was so interesting, moving, and amazingly told... As an italian girl with a strong passion for history, archeology and art, I'm not so easy to impresa, but at the end of the day I came back to my place feeling so thankful and rich. I recommend the tour to Masada ti everyone and the relaxing couple of hours at the Dead Sea is a pleasurable Moment, the cherry on top of a perfect experience and day. Thank you, Lorne! You've been amazing, at the same time a great "Bard" and story-teller, entertaining, smart and fine, and so precise, scientific and academic. Wish you the best and I hope to come back soon to the amazing Israel

Instead of spending so much time at River Jordan for those who did not wish to be baptised, I would have liked to see one or two churches in Tiberias instead of simply driving by. Amir Call Or, the guide of Bein Harim tours was very informative although I felt that he was one of the very few Israelis I met during my 12 day trip here who did not appreciate India.

We chose to have this tour on the day we arrived to TelAviv. It was an excellent choice since the guided tour took as to many areas of the city that we would not have discovered by ourselves. We learned a lot about the history and had good amount of exercise by walking 3hours.