Day Trips from Jerusalem: Which One to Book First

Our pick for a first visit

Book Masada and the Dead Sea Day Trip at $111. It is nine hours, hotel pickup included, and the price already covers Masada entry, the cable car up Herod's palace terraces and the Dead Sea beach where you float. It shows you a completely different landscape to Jerusalem, and it needs no decisions from you on the day.

Then add the half-day Bethlehem guided tour, also $75. Four hours from the David Citadel Hotel covers the Church of the Nativity, St Catherine's, the Milk Grotto and Shepherds' Field, and you are back with the afternoon still yours. Together the two cost about $186 and tick the two trips people actually cross the world for.

The rest of your time belongs to Jerusalem itself. The Old City alone rewards two days: the Western Wall, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the Via Dolorosa and the City of David.

If you only have one free day

Take the Jerusalem and Bethlehem Day Tour, $106, nine hours. It starts at the Mount Scopus viewpoint, works through Gethsemane, the Old City and the Western Wall, then crosses to Bethlehem in the afternoon for the Church of the Nativity. If your Jerusalem time is short, this is the trip that gives you both in one.

Its honest drawback is the Nativity grotto, the small chapel under the basilica marking the birthplace. On busy days groups are not always able to descend into it, and the tour notes say so plainly.

If you would rather see two landscapes in one day, the Bethlehem Old City and Dead Sea Tour at $150 does the Nativity sites in the morning and the float in the afternoon. Remember the Dead Sea beach entry is not included, and the guide travels with you only in Bethlehem.

The two long trips

For Petra from Jerusalem there is one honest answer: the 2-Day Petra Tour, $510 per person plus about $133 in border fees and the Jordanian visa paid at the crossing. Day one takes in Mount Nebo, the Madaba mosaic map and a night in a Bedouin-style camp, day two is Petra itself. Petra deserves more than a day-trip drive-by, and this is the only format we sell.

For Galilee from Jerusalem, the Nazareth and Sea of Galilee Tour packs Nazareth, Tabgha, Capernaum and the Jordan River into ten hours for $108. It is a long day with a lot of road, and on some days it starts with a 5:50 transfer to join the group in Tel Aviv. If the Galilee is a priority, weigh whether an overnight base there would suit you better. Conditions in the region change, so check your own government's travel advice before booking any cross-border trip.

The logistics, flatly

Bethlehem is about 10 km south of Jerusalem. Tours meet at the David Citadel Hotel on King David St 7 and drive to Checkpoint 300. Israeli taxis and cars rented in Israel cannot cross into Bethlehem, and Israeli citizens cannot cross there, which is why Israeli passport holders cannot join these tours.

You need a valid passport and a valid Israeli visa. The Palestinian guide meets the group at the checkpoint, and a change of vehicle may be required. Security checks on entering or leaving are routine. If you travel without a tour, buses 231 and 234 leave from Sultan Suleiman Street near Damascus Gate, with bus 234 stopping on the Jerusalem side of the checkpoint, then a walk of about 2 km to Manger Square or a local taxi. Full detail is on our Bethlehem guide.

The sites the tours cover

The Church of the Nativity on Manger Square was commissioned by Constantine the Great in 327 CE after an earlier destruction of the city under Hadrian, damaged in 529 and rebuilt under Justinian I. Christians revere it as the birthplace of Jesus. The silver-star grotto beneath the altar marks the spot, and on busy days group access down to it is not guaranteed.

The Chapel of the Milk Grotto sits a few minutes from Manger Square, carved in the soft white rock that tradition says took its colour from drops of milk while the Holy Family rested here. Shepherds' Field lies just outside town, the field where the shepherds of the Christmas story watched their flocks.

Both half-day tours cost from $75. The Elijah half-day includes entry to the listed sites, the alternative leaves church entries unpaid on the day. Back by early afternoon either way, leaving time for the Mount of Olives or Mahane Yehuda market.

Masada: what you are climbing to

Masada is a mountain-top fortress in the Judaean Desert rising more than 400 m over the terrain, about 20 km east of Arad. Herod the Great enclosed the summit with a casemate wall and built storerooms, bathhouses, an advanced water system and two palaces, one stepped across three terraces of the northern cliff. They remain among the finest examples of Herodian architecture.

The fortress is famous as the last holdout of Jewish rebels in the First Jewish-Roman War. After the destruction of Jerusalem, the Sicarii under Eleazar ben Ya'ir withstood a Roman siege built on a ramp. Josephus writes that when the wall was breached in 73/74 AD nearly 1,000 defenders were dead, an account historians still debate. Excavations in the 1960s found a synagogue, ritual baths and pottery shards inscribed with names. Masada is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the Roman siege lines below are among the most intact anywhere.

Both tours take the cable car up, so no climb is needed. Masada and the Dead Sea Day Trip is $111 over nine hours, the full day version is $115 over ten. Entry and cable car are included in both. The Masada and Dead Sea guide has more.

Floating at the Dead Sea

The Dead Sea is a landlocked salt lake whose surface lies about 439.78 m below sea level, the lowest land elevation on Earth. At 342 g per kg of salt, it is about 9.6 times saltier than the ocean, and the density makes swimming feel like floating. You simply lie back. The shore runs 6 to 8 degrees hotter than Jerusalem on the same day, a real difference after the cool of the hills.

Both Masada tours build in time on a public beach, 90 minutes on the $111 tour. The salt stings any cut, so shave before you go and keep water out of your eyes. The lake is receding fast, its area down from 1,050 square km in 1930 to about 605 square km today.

On your own, Egged bus 486 runs from the Central Bus Station to the beaches and Masada, about an hour to the first beach, with no service on Shabbat. By car it is about 1 hour 20 minutes. Ein Gedi and the Qumran caves are passed on the road but not visited on either tour.

The route and the camp

Petra is in Jordan, reached over the Allenby, or King Hussein, Bridge. The 2-Day Petra Tour from Abraham Tlalim Tours lists at $510 per person, two days and one night, departing from the bus stop outside Ha-Nevi'im St 67.

Day one crosses the border, then climbs to Mount Nebo, the ridge from which Moses is said to have looked over the promised land, and stops at Madaba, home of the sixth-century mosaic map of the Holy Land set into a church floor. The night is spent in a Bedouin-style camp, which puts you close to the site for the morning. Day two is Petra, the Nabataean city carved into rose-red sandstone cliffs, with a Jordanian guide from the border.

The $510 covers all entrance fees, meals and the camp. It does not cover everything: border fees and the Jordanian visa add about $133 per person, paid at the crossing. Budget roughly $643 in total before you buy so much as a postcard. Free cancellation runs to three days before the start, tighter than the 24-hour rule on the other tours.

Who this trip suits

This is the most expensive and the most demanding tour we sell from Jerusalem, and the only one that leaves the country. Israeli passport holders cannot join. The listing is not recommended for travellers with poor heart health, given the walking inside Petra.

If Petra is a dream rather than a priority, consider whether your days are better spent here. Two full days in Jerusalem cover the Old City, Yad Vashem and a private guide for far less money. But if Petra is why you came to this part of the world, this is the workable format from Jerusalem, and the camp night makes the early start at the Siq bearable. All group trips return the way they came, over the Allenby Bridge, passport and again the visa rules applying in both directions.

Nazareth and the Sea of Galilee in a day

The Sea of Galilee is a freshwater lake in the north of the country, and the villages around it hold the centres of Jesus's ministry. The Nazareth and Sea of Galilee Tour from Bein Harim lists at $108, ten hours, with hotel pickup in Jerusalem.

The day covers Nazareth, the town of Jesus's childhood, then Tabgha by the lake shore, traditional site of the feeding of the five thousand, then Capernaum, where the excavated synagogue and house ruins mark the base of that ministry, Capernaum's entry included in the price. The route finishes at the Jordan River, where many travellers stop to watch baptisms at the group's designated point.

Be honest about the driving. Jerusalem to the lake is a long haul each way, and on some days the tour starts with a 5:50 transfer to join the main group in Tel Aviv. Guides work in English, French, German or Spanish, and children under 4 cannot join. If Galilee from Jerusalem matters to you, it is doable in a day, but one full day is the honest minimum.

Fitting day trips around Jerusalem

Do not spend every day leaving. The city rewards time: our Jerusalem itinerary lays out one, two and three-day plans, and our answer to how many days are enough is that the Old City alone needs two. Slot your day trips on the days you would otherwise duplicate sites.

Watch Shabbat, from Friday sunset to Saturday nightfall. Public transport stops, so a Saturday in Jerusalem means walking or taxis, and the light rail does not run. Church sites in the Old City stay open, which makes Saturday a good day to be inside the walls rather than on a coach.

Weather decides the desert days. Jerusalem afternoon highs reach 30°C in July and August and drop to 13°C in January, and the Dead Sea shore runs 6 to 8 degrees hotter. Our best time to visit guide walks through the months. Sleep close to the action so early pickups hurt less: see where to stay in Jerusalem, and browse top Jerusalem tours for city days.