Re-booked
Our 18 March, 2021 Jordan and Egypt trip hasn't been cancelled- yet, but probably soon. Neither the 2022 dates nor rates have been published. However, since we were on the waitlist for 2022, Tauck called today to ask if we wanted to re-book for 2022. We were given a week to decide but made the decision to re-book now since COVID is not likely to get much better by March. Since our 2021 trip was paid in full we received the $500 ea. credit for re-booking . . . . maybe.*
*A note about the credit for re-booking. As some have already noted, you technically only get the credit once- the first time a trip is cancelled and you immediately re-book and leave your money with Tauck. The credit we received for re-booking our cancelled 2020 J&E trip last year is just labeled "Tauck Travel Wallet" but was not included in the "Total Payments" from our cancelled 2021 trip that were applied to our 2022 re-booking. It is also possible the new credit, also listed just as "Tauck Travel Wallet" in the upper section of our 2022 Summary of Purchase, was not applied. It is academic since the effect is the same- we only received a credit for one re-booking, not two. Either that or it's "new math." So much for compensation for the interest lost by not taking and investing a refund. I guess it is worth a call to Tauck, just to confirm it wasn't an error.
Oh, and the insurance went up $30 p/p.
For those who did not see the webinar with Dr. Waziri, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, today, he said he expected the GEM to be open in late 2021.
Comments
But he didn't sound too certain about that. I'm booked on Jewels of the Nile in Nov 2021 and was thinking about postponing. Surprisingly, the 2022 dates aren't up yet for that one, either.
I'm considering changing my December 2021 J&E to December 2022. I watched the webinar and I am not convinced the GEM will be open this year. As i have waited this long, what's another year to postpone the visit and be assured the GEM will be open. *Alan, I think you may be on to something with your statement predicting the GEM may not open until 2022 to celebrate the 100 years since Howard Carter discovered King Tut's tomb intact. I shifted my Magic of Morocco tour from 2021 to 2022 to accommodate moving J&E...perhaps I'll reverse back to Morocco for 2021--if travel is allowed
At this point, I hate having to wait another year (actually 417 days, but who is counting
), I just want to go, and though we don't have a choice, I would even give up seeing the GEM if we could go sooner than later- we are on our third booking attempt for this trip now!
What is also worrisome is terryilynn's report of an XMAS Mkts cruise being possibly cancelled by Tauck to accommodate another group. We are scheduled for a XMAS Mkts cruise too. Maybe I'll ask Tauck about that when I call to confirm about the $500 re-booking credit. This is all so depressing
We cancelled our March, 2021 trip this week. Even if by some miracle it wasn’t cancelled by Tauck, we have no desire to spend this much money and have to be covered by a mask in the airports, on the plane, on the bus, and while visiting all the attractions. At this point since this was the 3rd time we tried to go, we don’t have any plans to reschedule. I think, for us, this was not meant to be😢
_Hi, We are booked for the 9/30/21 Jordan and Egypt, small group tour. Wondering who else might be joining us this year? We are from Scottsdale, Arizona. We are really looking forward to it. Barbara
Best of luck! However, if I were a betting man, I would say you'll be very lucky if your tour goes. At this point, all you can do is continue to hope and research, while preparing yourself for the possibility it won't go. We are booked for March 2022, our third attempt at J&E. I will believe it when we are at the welcome dinner.
Alan, can I ask why you picked March? Is it the best weather? I’m looking at 2023 at this point, at least for Egypt.
Yes, 100% for weather. Earlier in the winter (Jan to early Feb) you can actually have snow in Petra. Amman and Jerash can be quite cool at that time as well. Even in late March when we are scheduled to go, temps in Petra are only expected to top out in the 60's. Egypt on the other hand will be just about right at that time with the highest temps in Aswan and Luxor in the 80's. Once you get into April and May, temps in Egypt, especially Aswan and Luxor can easily top 100° which continue into the fall. Bottom line, there is no time where temps in both areas will be ideal. A good website for weather is WeatherSpark (link) where temps, precip, humidity, etc. are presented in textual and easy to interpret graphical format for day, month, year and are based on extensive historical data for many locations around the world.
Thank you, Alan. I wasn’t familiar with WeatherSpark. I’ll check it out. I should be retired by 2023, so I’ll have more flexibility in scheduling.
WeatherSpark is fairly easy to use, but may take some experimenting to find and figure out how to use all its features, so let me know if you have any questions. I wanted weather/temp info for a few places not covered by WeatherSpark, e.g. Kempinski Hotel Ishtar on the Dead Sea- it is usually much warmer there than Amman or Jerash. Daytime temps are only supposed to be in the 60's in both those places- waaayyy to too cool cold for a Dead Sea float! I've read it is warmer at the Dead Sea but had to search to find a good source of info. The hotel website lists the current temp but no forecasts, etc. and I'm not too sure it is accurate. Further searching yielded Freemeteo (link) which provided temps in close by Swemeh (Swaimeh), Jordan. Right now they are both showing about the same (69° F @ 9:06 pm)
I envy you, unless you are retiring well past the normal retirement age, because, hopefully, you should have many years of traveling left. I retired fairly early but didn't start traveling until much later and now I feel as though I'm running out of time! We traveled with Tauck for 7+ years before this horrid (2 year?) COVID interruption. We are set to restart in March 2022 with J&E. Our health is fine, but we are feeling our age and not sure how many more good years of traveling we have left.
p.s. some folks, including my wife claim I'm undiagnosed OCD
but for the past few years, whenever selecting and planning a trip, I check the weather and even make a little spreadsheet of places and temps (When we re-booked from Mar 2020 we were initially stuck with a 26 Jan 2021 departure which was an oddity- it was suppose to travel N to S for the Nile river segment. We subsequently got a spot on the 18 Mar departure before that was eventually cancelled):
Alan - when I was in Jordan in mid Nov 2019, the Dead Sea area was much warmer than surrounding areas. While it was 70ish in Amman and Petra and 90-95 (and dry) at the Dead Sea. it felt very much like Vegas in May.
If you're looking for Dead Sea statistics, you might also check the Israeli side, as it's only a few miles away and they probably have more stats available. At night from the Dead Sea Jordan hotel, you can see the lights of Jerusalem.
AlanS - Based on your charts above I would have opted for the Oct 28 - 9 Nov. trip. For 2 degrees warmer at Aswan (87 vs 85) and Cairo (79 vs 77), you get 7 degrees warmer at Petra (67 vs 60), 11 degrees warmer Amman (72 vs 61), and the same at Aswan. Your low 60s are too cool for me, for a golf shirt type of vacation.
Sam - Can you be a little more specific? 😁
There's more than temperature to consider when I book trips. It doesn't apply to the Middle East, but consider rainy seasons. I recall a [post a few years ago from a woman complaining it rained every day during her June Japan trip. There's a reason they call it rainy season. In Egypt, March/April tends to be sandstorm season, so that is something to consider.
Alan, I’m actually retiring earlier than I thought I would, and I’m just grateful that I didn’t retire already. I’m hoping that my retirement year will coincide with more normal travel conditions.
We were lucky to take several trips with Tauck while I was on a sabbatical. Since then, we’ve been limited to Christmas holidays, which isn’t the best time to travel in majority Christian countries. Our last trip ended when we flew back from Bangkok on January 7, 2020 - the day they reported their 1st COVID case. Apparently we were there with 20K Chinese, many from Wuhan, oddly. We were so lucky to have a last trip at the very end of normality.
We’re very much looking forward to J & E.
We looked at that timeframe, but it is a busy time of year for us and way too close to our XMAS Mkts cruise.
Plus, if we had chosen Oct 2021 it might be cancelled also and if we had chosen Oct 2022 we would have had to wait even longer! As it is, we only have 372 days to go! 
Also, while it is anyone's guess when it will open, we have a reasonable shot as visiting the GEM. I guess I'll see what's new with that.
The fall before Tauck restarted, former forum regular Joyce Welch got tired of waiting and went with A&K on a tour with similar itinerary, except they flew from Jordan to Egypt via Amman then Cairo rather than flying from Aqaba to Aswan, like Tauck. Anyway, she went, for a great discount, in Aug/Sept and literally melted with temps well over 100° F on several days
Allen: we will be on the same trip next March! See you then. I told my granddaughter not to be too disappointed as the pyramids will still be there next year!
Tell your granddaughter it won't be long now- it is only 335 days, 3 hours, 54 min. and 17 seconds until J&E*, but who's counting?