Travel in the Middle East – Family Travel Blog

It’s been over 3 years: time for some Greatest Hits

I just want to say that this blog post’s title is totally awful SEO (Search Engine Optimization) ’cause I’m feeling like a REBEL. 🙂

Those who know me, know how my mental gears grind and how I over-analyze.

I prefer to think it’s my massive intelligence coming to the fore, but mostly I think it’s plain old worry-wart perfectionist tendencies.

Anyway, after crying in my beer this week about blog ranking, I dug around in the Family Travel Logue archives to find some posts to bring back out into the light.

This allows my readers some discovery fun and also helps me to remember that blogging is not all about whether I dominate Google for certain search terms in exchange for some ad dollars.

….because, you know, I could have my way with Google if I really wanted to (she says with a lot of bluster.)

In between the dust and cat hair, here are some of my family travel blog favorites pulled from the Archives attic. Please excuse any broken links – some of the posts have been around awhile and the Web keeps moving:

*** Travel in Second Life. Because I don’t get enough of it in First Life and I like my Goth avatar.

*** Inexpensive Travel Souvenirs. Because I was just starting to figure out video and I combined total vlogging inexperience with all of my worldly shopping from all over my house. Yay!

*** Best US family beach vacations. Because it’s summer, you know?

*** Survivor’s guide to Walt Disney World. This was when I figured out that I ought to listen to my readers even though I’m not personally a huge Florida theme park fan.

*** Visit bountiful Brussels and What my daughter learned in Belgium’s Flanders Fields. We never felt more immersed in Europe than in Belgium (and the Netherlands, so here’s Rotterdam for you.)

*** Winner of the who-knew-I’d-love-it award: Big Country – the Kansas Flint Hills.

*** Two of my first big hits: Paris with kids – The Louvre, followed by High above Paris: a meal in the Eiffel Tower.

I was reading a post on World Hum (a very eclectic and fun travel Web site) that made me think about travel to Israel and whether or not it is too dangerous, which is always a topic of travel discussion.

My own trip to Israel as a single person was very brief; a Navy ship port visit to the city of Haifa, and a guided tour to some of the country’s highlights. I will confess that the entire time on the tour van was a bit nerve-wracking, as we were all US Navy Sailors and made a rather high-visibility and easy terrorist target.

Fortunately, as a woman I was not so obviously a military person (I can avoid the whole short-hair thing, and I don’t wear blinding white athletic shoes like the average American.) I decided that I had a very generous life insurance policy, so if it was my time to croak, my family would hopefully have one heck of a party after my demise.

We didn’t spend much time in Haifa, and the tour included highlights of Bethlehem, amazing sights of Jerusalem like the Wailing Wall and Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, the sobering Jewish stronghold of Masada, nightlife in Tel Aviv and a swim in the Dead Sea.

Here’s the deal, gals — DO NOT go swimming in the Dead Sea right after you shave your legs. The water has a super-high salt and mineral content (that’s what makes it so buoyant) and sticking freshly-shaved legs into it is like liquid styptic pencil. It’s like having your legs cauterized all at once. Ow.

If you’re considering a family trip to Israel (and here’s one family who made the trek) you will need to weigh the obvious dangers with the educational and spiritual benefit. Ironically, it’s very similar to my thoughts on travel with kids to Iran.

Keep abreast of the current situation, evaluate the dangers as unemotionally as possible, and make your best decision. As we so appallingly saw at Virginia Tech, there’s no hiding from nut-cases, so live your best and bravest life.

Next year, in Jerusalem….

Update 23 April 2007: Thanks to the very active and interesting Haveil Havalim blog carnival for featuring this post, and to Soccer Dad David Gerstman (the carnival host) for also recommending a book on family travel to Israel.

Technorati tags: travel, family travel, Israel, Middle East