Thompson Travelers

To all of our family and friends,

We are so blessed to have you in our lives. We wish you and your families a very Happy Thanksgiving filled with blessings, health, and abundance.

This holiday, we will be spending it on a trip through the Holy Land. We will be walking through many cities where Jesus walked…I’m sure it’s going to be interesting!

We are a bit zombie-like after a long 14 hour flight from SF to Tel Aviv. The only thing we have seen so far is the fabulous beach which is half a block from our hotel.

You start to unwind as soon as you see the open blue sea and miles of clean, wide stretches of beautiful white sand and the Mediterranean.  It’s a beautiful 73° here today, but it is no longer summer, and a gloomy haze hangs over the water, and alas, the beach visitors are transitioning into the winter months.  It’s great for us tho…not too crowded!  

This city boasts of nine miles of some of the  best beaches anywhere, with National Geographic rating Tel Aviv is the 9th best beach city in the world and we can see why.

If you love the beach, they have it all.  You’ll find surfing, sailing, pickle ball, volleyball, beachfront seafood restaurants, windsurfing, lounge chairs, umbrellas, weight lifting gyms, and just plain hanging out on the beautiful white sand.

Based on the number of restaurants around the beach, this city has a pretty great night life, so it definitely a party city during the high season.  80% of the people here speak Hebrew, 20% speak Arabic, and almost everyone speaks English as it is taught to all in schools, so its pretty easy for Americans to get around.

We are on our own for dinner and are going to a Restaurant where our friend Renee’ worked briefly while she was going to a French cooking school.  According to yelp, it’s rated as one of the best restaurants in the city.  Well, it’s a bit different, because it’s our first exposure to kosher foods.  According to the Torah, there are tons of food rules.  In  small nutshell, no dairy mixed with meat, no consumption of animals that aren’t cloven hooves and chew their cud…which means no pork.  They can only eat fish with scales and fins, so no shellfish, and that’s just the beginning of the rules.  Wow, there are lots of restrictions in kosher food, which is why we have lamb paella instead of seafood paella in a French restaurant and there is no escargot…I guess that qualifies as a shelled critter?

Our official tour starts tomorrow with a group of 36 people with Gate 1 Tours.  We hope you tag along and follow us to learn about this part of the world.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!