Jewish Heritage Tours: from the Holocaust to gastronomy

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Written by Linda Hohnholz

Sophia Kulich was born in Ukraine, former Soviet Union. After leaving Ukraine in 1982, she lived in Europe before coming to the USA. Since then she has traveled the world extensively.

Sophia Kulich was born in Ukraine, former Soviet Union. After leaving Ukraine in 1982, she lived in Europe before coming to the USA. Since then she has traveled the world extensively.

Just last week a Travel Market Report article summed up her life and career to date.

Sophia wanted to share her considerable knowledge and her passion for travel with clients venturing all over the world, so in 1993 she opened a boutique travel agency specializing in creative itineraries (independent and private tours) for individuals and small groups. Her scrupulous attention to details helped her tours quickly became best sellers.

Some of the examples she created include: “Kitchen and Art Tour,” high-end Ferrari driving, staying in Relais and Chateaux and eating with top chefs in the Swiss and Italian Alps. She also had success with literature art tours like Harry Potter, Fairy Tales in Germany, “Memoirs of a Geisha,” and “Following steps of Chagall.”

Her specialties include but are not limited to WWII history, art, music and literary tours, architecture, cultural experiences, wine, gastronomy, and Jewish travel. During her last trip to Japan, she researched and designed Jewish Heritage of Japan (unbelievably, there is some Jewish history!).

Her favorite destination in Japan is Hokkaido Island.

She traveled to less-known destinations and created tours in Bosnia, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, and many others.

She builds her creative itineraries from scratch using local trusted contacts in each destination, most of whom she has tested and explored herself. This results in a distinctly personal travel experience for each client. For this, she was named as one of the top 25 travel agents in the USA by Travel Agent Magazine in 2010.

She was featured in the Wall Street Journal in Travel Weekly and various Jewish press.

Sophia also heads the Jewish Travel Agency which scrupulously stitches together tourism experiences for clients along the seams of once-forgotten and lost family history. She takes small groups, families, and multigenerational groups on a heritage enlightenment experience. Her agency specializes in providing a distinctly personal travel experience to clients in a cultural and physical landscape, and specialized tours and Holocaust research for Jewish travelers. One of the trips she researched resulted in re-uniting an American family with a Ukrainian family where the Ukrainian women saved their mother as a girl during the Holocaust.

She has also organized cultural connections for synagogue groups to Eastern Europe.

She practically covers the world with her Jewish interest itineraries worldwide, either for cruise or land-based travelers.

Sophia relates this work to the detective work of Jonathan Safran Foerโ€™s โ€œEverything is Illuminated.โ€ Like Jonathan, many of us yearn to uncover the lost stories of our Jewish heritage in distant lands, to trace the footsteps of our ancestors, to inhabit the space where they once stood.

She is also an accomplished travel blogger where her clients follow her travels around the world at sophiastravel.wordpress.com

Through Jewishtravelagency.blogspot.com , she is connected to the local Jewish community and people.

Sophia offers a commission to travel agents starting at 12% which grows with volume.

For more information, visit http://www.sophiastravel.com/TravelAgents.htm
or http://www.jewishtravelagency.com

Call 877-466-2934, local 727-254-4373 or email [email protected] or [email protected]

About the author

Avatar of Linda Hohnholz

Linda Hohnholz

Editor in chief for eTurboNews based in the eTN HQ.

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