The ALP tours January Newsletter

Cambodia will be first, so that if you came on the Thailand and Cambodia tour you may wish to join in Vietnam and if you think the tour will be too long you can skip Tibet….

There’s no Jewish history in Cambodia – though there are a few dozen Jews (ex pats of various nationalities) in Phnom Pehn.

Perhaps surprisingly Wikipedia has a long article on the Jews of Vietnam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Vietnam who presumably came there in the late 19th century with the French. (In 1939, the estimated combined Jewish communities of Haiphong, Hanoi, Saigon and Tourane in French Indo-China numbered approximately 1,000) Israel opened its Embassy in Hanoi in 1993 and Chabad opened a center in Ho Chi Minh City in 2006. So in the main this will not be a Jewish history tour but of course a 100% kosher one. Shai Bar Ilan will be in charge of kashrut.

Shorter forays into Jewish history could be to Spain and to Italy, and of course the Galapagos and Ecuador still beckons. South Africa (safari included) are on some of your wish lists too. So please do drop me a line and tell me where you would seriously consider going.
Next:

Pesach in China

Shai Bar Ilan are again taking over a hotel in China for Pesach – this time The Vaton Yungi Resort Hotel on the outskirts of Hangzhou.

The ‘tour’ starts in Shanghai where guests will be met at Shanghai International Airport on April 6th 2009 and stay for two nights in Shanghai. There will be a tour of the highlights of Shanghai, including places of Jewish interest on the 7th and on the 8th April the party goes by coach to Hangzhou.

There will be guided walks on Yom Tov and Shabbat, a complete second day Yom Tov schedule and a full touring program during Chol Hamoed

The cost – excluding the international fares – per person sharing is $2950 (that’s for a standard room) you can have a room with a view for $3290 or a mini suite for $3470 or a deluxe suite costs $3790. The single supplement is $1990 regardless.

NB Gratuities for local service providers are $15 per person per day during Pesach and $10 per person per day for the post- Pesach tour. This will be collected by Shai Bar Ilan staff and distributed to the relevant local service providers.

The ‘full’ tour continues after Pesach to Guilin, Xian and finishes in Beijing on the 23rd April.

The cost of the post Pesach tour is $1990 per person sharing (no choice of rooms) and the single supplement is $320

If you are interested in joining this please let me know as I would like to make sure that you are going to be met from your flight to Shanghai and also I will find out what hotels are being offered in Shanghai and Guilin, Xian and Beijing.

Best regards to allAviva ALP tours :

e mail: aviva@winnock.co.uk or avivapreston@hotmail.com
Tel: (+44) (0)208 997 7083 (most of the time), Israel (+972)(0)77 525 5341(Some of the time!)