Fred Rosenbaum's lectures and Rajeev Solomon's and Chandana's information and caring manner made this trip an excellent learning experience. The hotels were very nice, although there was very little opportunity to walk and explore the areas independently since there were no sidewalks in most areas. I found Ariel dismissive of my need for assistance in identifying food that was safe for me due to a food allergy (fortunately Rajeev stepped in to help me with this), his explanations of Jewish ritual were very elementary and he ignored several relevant comments by women. So my spouse and I are not sure we'd choose another Tiyul trip.

Best Guides; Best Hotels, and an in-depth historical backgrounds to every site we saw. Ariel is so experienced in the travel field that, once again, he only chooses the best in-country travel services who provide gorgeous 5-star hotels in the best locations, ie The Trident Narriman Pt on the Arabian Sea and the Rajputana in Jaipur, which felt like we were staying in a 2025 Maharaja Palace. Rajeev, our India guide throughout the entire trip, has taken thousands of visitors throughout India during his 30 year career and is extremely knowledgeable about India's 3,000 year history and it's current place in the world. In addition we had 2 other City guides in Mumbai and Kochi who were fabulous also and very experienced in guiding and use of perfect English. Overlaid on top of the Indian guides, we had Fred Rosenbaum as our Jewish history guide who is unsurpassed in his knowledge of not only Jewish world history but specifically an expert on the migration patterns of several groups of Jews who had emigrated and stayed in India; starting from Babylonia after the burning of the 2nd Temple, continuing on from the Inquisition and through the 19th Century, including The Baghdadi Jews who still have a functioning synagogue in Mumbai. No matter how many more trips we go on with Ariel or any other organizations, I can't imagine that anything will top this Indian experience. We can't thank Ariel enough for putting together this Class A Act and we're looking forward to another exotic trip with him.

Wonderful trip. Great guides, food and terrific people. Highly recommend the organization and would definitely recommend this travel company to my friends for future travel. I was impressed with all aspects of the trip and particularly found the guides exceptional. Really learned a lot.

It was great spending time with people from Anshe Emeth including Rabbi Bennett Miller and his wife, Joan. Special thanks to Laura Leibowitz for finding and booking the hotel in the airport when several of us missed our flight home. The trip had a good mix of Jewish culture and history, general Portuguese culture and history, scenery and nature. The accommodations and the included food were top notch. I felt that our first guide, Sandra, walked and spoke too fast, particularly on our day of arrival and on the morning of the next day on the bus.

The trip to Portugal was great. We traveled with a wonderful group of people, ate good food, and had comfortable accommodations. We learned and experienced much that would be unavailable to us with any other tour group. All but one day was well planned. We were there in the rainy season and it rained almost the whole time we were in Lisbon. The Hotel Da Baixa in Lisbon was our favorite. All in all, it was a fabulous trip and has left us with great memories and a desire to return.