Middle East - 2023
Israel 2023
We started our tour in Tel Aviv before moving on to Caesarea, Haifa, Acre, and Nazareth and Tiberias. We did a tour of the Agmon Hahula natural reserve. We then moved on to the Golan Heights, before heading to the Mount of Beatitudes and then to the Dead Sea. We visited Masada NP before travelling to Jerusalem and Bethlehem.
Jordan 2023
We moved on from Jerusalem to Amman, and then to Jerash to visit the ancient Greco-Roman ruins. On our journey south we visited Mount Nebo and Madaba on our way to Petra. We spent the better part of the day hiking through the valley. We next did a fun truck run in Wadi Rum and stayed the night in a glamp tent in the desert before returning to Amman.
Egypt 2023
We did a quick overnight in Cairo before heading to Luxor and a seven day Nile River cruise. Along the cruise we visited Karnak temple, Luxor temple, Kom Umbu, Valley of the Kings, Temple of Hatshepsut, Philae temple, Aswan High Dam, and had high tea at the Old Cataract Hotel. Back in Cairo, we visited the Pyramids of Giza, the Sphinx, and the Sakkara Step Pyramid of Zoser.
Europe 2018
Our grand tour of Europe
Our grand tour lasted 40 weeks on two continents, in 33 countries visiting 107 cities. We stayed in 62 AirBnb’s, 33 hotels, 4 safari lodges and travelled by countless trains and buses, 7 ferries, 20 flights, at least a thousand kilometres by safari Land Cruiser, and almost 1000 miles in a rental car through Wales.
January 2018
We started our 9 month tour through Europe in Madrid, thinking Spain would be warm in January, but it wasn’t. We travelled to Valencia, Granada and Malaga, then continued to be cold in Tangier, Casablanca, and Marrakesh, before returning to Seville. We did a few side trips along the way: Malaga to Gibraltar, Tangier to Chefchouen, Marrakesh to the Orouka Valley.
February 2018
From Seville we travelled by bus to Merida, then to Lisbon. From Lisbon we went to Porto then flew across to Barcelona, then Palma and back to Barcelona to overnight before heading to Marseille by train. We took an overnight ferry to Ajaccio on Corsica. This was not a pleasant few day. We were both sick and it snowed and there was almost nothing opened. Fortunately we had a lovely AirBnB.
March 2018
We overnighted on the north end of Sardinia in the small town of Santa Teresa di Gallura before moving on to Cagliari. Then we flew to Cattania on Sicily before travelling to Valetta in Malta. We also stayed on the northern island of Gozo for a few days before moving back to Sliema. Then we headed to Athens to hook up with my cousin Sue and her husband Newt to tour around Greece. We visited Tinos, Santorini, and Crete after spending several days in Athens
April 2018
From Crete we finished Greece on Rhodes. We parted ways with Sue and Newt. Then we moved on to Croatia for a couple of weeks before travelling to Istanbul on the way to Nairobi and our 8 day safari. We saw so much game in Samburu, Lake Nakuru, Lake Naivasha, and ending at Maasai Mari before returning to Nairobi. There has to be a just for those 8 days.
May 2018
May was spent travelling around England and Wales. We landed in London from Nairobi and slept for a day. After touring London for 5 days, we headed to Peterborough where we day tripped to Cambridge, Nottingham, and Leicester. We did a quick detour to Lincoln before going to Winchester. Here we day tripped to Stonehenge, Salisbury, and Portsmouth. We did a few more stops in England including Plymouth, Dartmouth, Bristol, and Bath before going to Cardiff. Here we rented a car for our tour of Wales and visited Mountain Ash (family thing), Caerphilly, Pembroke, Aberystwyth, Beaumaris, and Gloucester before ending up in Birmingham to leave for Romania.
June 2018
We found Britain to be way too expensive for our Canadian savings and we needed to stay out of Schengen for June so we popped over to Romania where it was way cheaper. We did quite a circle covering Bucharest, Brasov, Piatra Neamt, Cluj Napoca, Sibiu, Timisoara, Belgrade, Nis, Sofia, Plovdiv, Varna, and back to Bucharest to return to Scotland and Aberdeen before meeting up with our next group of travel companions.
July 2018
We arrived back in Scotland with enough time to do a quick 2 day sidetrip to Aberdeen before meeting up with the grandaughters and their mom in Glasgow. We toured Glasgow, Inverness, and Edinburgh before flying to Paris. After leaving the girls in Paris, we moved on to Bordeaux, Lyon, Bern, Cologne, Brussels, and Rotterdam. We did several side trips along the way including St. Emillion, Ghent, and Amsterdam.
August 2018
In August we headed north to Bremen, Odense, Copenhagen, Oslo, and Bergen. From there we flew to Stockholm, then Helsinki. We took a ferry over to Tallin and started south again through Riga and Vilnius. From there we started our tour of Poland visiting Warsaw, Krakow, and Wroclaw.
Sept./Oct. 2018
As our time started winding down, we picked up the pace. After leaving Berlin, we made it to Leipzig, Prague, Nuremberg, Munich, Salzburg, and Vienna where we stopped and rested for a few days. Then we were off to Brno, Bratislava, Graz, Ljubljana, and finishing our Europe journey in Budapest in early October.