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Walking tour of Old Prague, Jewish Quarter

Yvonne was our guide a few summers ago, pre COVID, before travel was shut down. We were particularly interested in the Jewish Quarter. Yvonne took us to see the old synagogues and the Jewish cemetery where the Maharal is buried. Yvonne was both knowledgeable and enthusiastic to share the history of each place with us and in making suggestions for other tours on a return trip when we would have more time to explore. One synagogue was built like a fortress, a reminder to us of how precarious the lives of the Jews were, always at risk of a pogrom. Another synagogue was set up like a museum with all kinds of Judaica set up in display cases with descriptions well placed to take us back to days when the ritual objects were part of real life every day. The last synagogue we saw has the names of every Jew who was deported and killed in the Holocaust written on the walls. As Elie Weisel exhorted, all that is needed for evil to be perpetrated is silence, with no one speaking out in protest or acting to help.

Yvonne was so personable and enthusiastic about the history of her birth place. We hope to return again soon now that travel is possible.

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We visited Prague in spring 2019 and touring the Jewish Quarter of Prague with Yvonne was the highlight of our trip. She is very knowledgeable and passionate about Jewish history. We toured several synagogues with exhibitions inside. The Jewish Quarter of Prague, with its synagogues and medieval Jewish cemetery, is the most beautiful I have ever seen. Yvonne was also very good with keeping the timeline with her explanation according to the sides we visited. We talked about Jewish history from the 10th century until today. She is a real professional with a love for her subject, I can't imagine visiting Jewish Prague with anyone else. We have also visited the Terezin ghetto with the same team of Terezin Private Tours. Pavel Batel was our guide and our group agreed that he is the best storyteller we have ever met. If you are visiting Prague and you are interested in Jewish history... 100% recommend contacting them.

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We wanted an in depth tour of Jewish Prague, and were lucky enough to book Yvonne (who has a wonderful social media page!) in advance. She is everything you could want in a tour guide/historian - knowledgeable, passionate, articulate and paced our tour beautifully. She made Jewish Prague come alive in a way that no guide book ever could. If you have the chance- book a tour with Yvonne - it was transformative!

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My family (7 adults total) and I booked a tour of the Jewish quarter with Yvonne and could not be happier to have done so. Yvonne was not only extremely knowledgeable (and wise beyond her years!) but has the magic touch every good guide needs: of being friendly, patient and pure fun to spend the day with. It is not always easy to make a group of 7 people (we were a mixed group of Israelis and Canadians, younger adults and older ones, differing levels of background knowledge) all happy but everyone was thrilled with the day. Disclaimer: I myself am a tour guide for Jewish heritage tours in Poland and at Yad Vashem, so I am always looking for the added value beyond what I can find independently. While all the sites are beautiful and impressive on their own, they were exponentially more interesting and valuable with Yvonne's guidance. It was particularly interesting to hear her own "insider" perspective as a young person involved in the Prague Jewish community.

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I can not recommend this group enough! terezin-private-tours.com Yvonne was kind and so knowledgeable showing us the Jewish Quarter in Prague but the experience with Pavel exceeded any of our expectations. I mentioned earlier I had so many tours with my family and have met so many tour guides but none of them deserved my time to write about them. Now I am writing the third one because we are still talking about the Terezin ghetto and Pavel with my teenage sons. Jacob, my oldest one has just finished Pavel's book about Bialystok children and he is looking forward to another one called Yom Kippur about Fredy Hirsch! Our entire trip to the Czech republic was one big unforgettable life changing Jewish experience!

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@Chaim Zagorski- Thank you for updating Pavel Batel’s new website. This is helpful to those searching a Terezin and Jewish quarter tour. When we took Pavel’s tour in 2019 we discussed his books. At the time I asked if he considered doing an audio version. He thought that was a possibility. I could only imagine how powerful that would be. That said, I don’t recall the name of his book about the Bialystok children?