Tauck Team Performed Miracles

Scott826 · October 2023

We arrived to our Tel Aviv hotel early on Thursday, October 5. We were supposed to begin our Tauck Israel/Jordan tour on Saturday afternoon, October 7. On Saturday morning, October 7, a siren suddenly blasted at approximately 7:00AM. As I looked out the window to make sure the sirens were from outside, multiple explosions went off. Immediately, the hotel intercom directed us to our 17th floor "bomb shelter." We went there immediately and made 3 other trips there that day.

Later Saturday afternoon in the hotel Lobby, we bumped into Erich, our Tauck guide. He said the Tauck people were working on things and that he'd have some announcements that evening at our introduction dinner. At 6:30 that night, we met our group of travelers and of course, by that time, much more was known about the Hamas invasion of Israel. Instead of having time to meet and greet everyone, Erich announced that we were leaving Israel the next morning so we needed to pack and be downstairs at 7:00AM the next morning.

At 7:30AM Sunday morning, we boarded a bus that would take us to the Jordanian border crossing east thru the West Bank. 50 Tauck customers were loaded into 2 buses and under armed escort, we drove thru Jerusalem and Jericho before finally arriving at the border crossing. At this particular border station, they only allow 100 people per day to cross and overnight, the Tauck team had arranged for 50 of those 100 to be us. While waiting for over 2 hours, we watched only a handful of cars/buses/trucks go through. Finally, our 2 buses were directed to the front of the line and they ushered us through. It took us 6 hours to make the 1 1/2 hour drive, but we made it to our Amman hotel by about 2:30PM Sunday afternoon. We were out!!!

Tauck and our guide Erich did an incredible job making arrangements and getting us escorted out of Israel so quickly. It was truly an amazing effort and I can never thank them enough, especially now seeing how many people are still unable to get out of Israel. It was only later that Erich told us that he hardly slept for those 48 hours and in 9 years at Tauck, this was by far his hardest assignment!

Thank you Tauck and Erich! You are truly heros. You did your job and like few can truly say, you really took care of your customers! The entire Tauck team deserves every ounce of gratitude from both Jojo and me. You recognized the danger and for 48 hours you worked tirelessly to arrange our departure. Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU!! TAUCK IS AN AMAZING COMPANY!