Pesach retreat in the Greek islands
The five-star hotel on the popular island of Rhodes is set on the waterfront at Kallithea beach, just a 15-minute drive from the city centre, and boasts facilities including outdoor and indoor heated pools, Turkish steam bath, gym, sauna and spa with 13 treatment rooms.
IN 2001 David and Chana Walles started Oz Kosher Getaways, which introduced a Pesach retreat on the Gold Coast for Australians who wanted to celebrate a kosher Pesach in style.
In 2008 David, Chana and their four children made aliyah and continued in the travel industry by purchasing Eddie’s Travel & Tourism Ltd, which was established in London in 1979.
“We wanted to bring our own style into the business and scale it up,” David told The AJN by phone from Israel. “When we purchased the company, there was only one Pesach hotel in Tiberias, but the rebranded business – known as Kosher Travelers – grew rapidly with exotic kosher tours and cruises around the world and multiple Pesach hotels in Israel.”
David and Chana are excited that Kosher Travelers is launching its first international Pesach program for 2023 at the luxury Elysium Resort and Spa in the Greek islands from April 4-16.
The five-star hotel on the popular island of Rhodes is set on the waterfront at Kallithea beach, just a 15-minute drive from the city centre, and boasts facilities including outdoor and indoor heated pools, Turkish steam bath, gym, sauna and spa with 13 treatment rooms.
Pesach packages are available for eight nights, 10 nights or 12 nights with the entire hotel kosher glatt mehadrin under the supervision of Rabbi Nechamia Rottenberg of Vienna.
“Other operators of Pesach retreats in USA and Europe cram more than 1000 people into a hotel, but our 2023 Pesach retreat at Elysium Resort and Spa is capped at a maximum of 500 guests so that everyone attending is a VIP guest in five-star comfort,” said David, who, with Chana, will be the hosts of the Pesach retreat.
Among the guest speakers are scholar and author Rabbi David Fohrman, head of the Aleph Beta institute in the US; Rabbi Daniel Hadar from Miami Beach, who founded Next Sephardic Generation, a grassroots organisation aimed at revitalising the Ladino-Sephardi community worldwide; and leading Australian scholar Rabbi Dr Laibl Wolf, who has attended Kosher Travelers’ Pesach retreats for many years.
Entertainment will be led by popular Israeli singer Ohad Moskowitz, who rose to international stardom in 2003 with his first solo album, and The Solomon Brothers, an Israeli band of family members who have enjoyed worldwide success.
While the Elysium Resort and Spa takes the spotlight, Kosher Travelers’ 2023 Pesach flagship retreat in Israel will be at the Nof Ginosar Hotel in the Galilee overlooking Lake Kinneret, and gateway to northern Israel for day trips.
“Pesach is unique because it brings together multi-generational families, including family members living in different parts of the world,” said David, noting that many guests at Pesach retreats were repeat bookings.
David studied at Yeshivah College in Melbourne, graduating in 1986 and went to Monash University, where he completed a Bachelor of Business degree, majoring in marketing.
In 1991 he married Chana in Melbourne, who also has a Bachelor of Business degree and has completed additional studies in events management. One of their first travel ventures more than 20 years ago was recruiting on campus and accompanying hundreds of university students to Israel on a six-week Jerusalem fellowship program.
“It was a predecessor to the Birthright program,” David explained. “We developed a passion for travel and especially the niche kosher tourism industry.”
Like most of the global travel industry, COVID-19 had a major impact on Kosher Travelers.
“COVID hit us really hard, but we have survived and are now on fast track to where we were pre-2020 and are experiencing what has been coined ‘revenge travel’,” David said.
When Israel’s borders were closed to tourists in 2020, vaccinated Israelis could travel within the country and Kosher Travelers started arranging a series of three-day high-end wine tours to the Golan Heights and northern Negev.
“These tours really proved popular. Israel’s award-winning wine industry has taken off, and we now run these tours for tourists who have visited all the classic sites in Israel and want to dive deeper into the culinary and wine experience,” David said.
When the Abraham Accords were signed in 2020 and relations normalised between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Kosher Travelers established ties in the UAE and have since operated six kosher tours to the region.
For more information and to receive a free newsletter, visit koshertravelers.com
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