Situation in the Middle East

Not going on the tour, but watching closely as my daughter is at university in Türkiye. Don't have any reason to be concerned at the moment. It's a big country...

Our current plans show us in Turkey April 4 to 16 and Georgia April 16 to 25. Neither country is yet involved. Its yet to be seen if events expand or not. We are watching closely as well. Both the Canadian and US government country specific travel advisories have not changed for Turkey and Georgia. In fact for some time, Georgia has had a more favourable travel advisory than most Western European countries.

Its a personal choice, and at the moment we are not seeing any overt signs requiring a change of course.

Trust in Rick and his company to monitor the situation, and modify the plans if conditions warrant it. Should concerns cause tour changes to happen, they won’t wait until the very last minute to act.

Check your travel insurance. Some policies don't cover travelers if a country is at a certain security risk level. But again, the RS Company won't put you in danger. Good luck!

My concern is the airspace.....getting in and out of turkey. I saw OAT just cancelled their Egypt tour.

Turkish airspace has not been impacted - and there are routes in and out that are not impacted either. Coming from Europe there is no impact at all, and from Asia flights are typically coming over Turkeminstan, across the Caspian, and Azerbaijan. I flew this route a couple of weeks ago to Istanbul, and also in June last year when the US and Israel struck Iran - it doesn't enter Iranian airspace at all, nor any of the Gulf countries. In more peaceful times we would fly through the Gulf.

Egypt is nowhere near Türkiye.

I’m concerned especially after the missile headed for Turkey intercepted by NATO this morning. Do we have options for a refund if tensions continue to deteriorate, or transfer to different RS Tour.

We are scheduled to be on that tour! We are watching very closely. We trust that Rick Steves will also be watching closely and will make a wise decision in this regard. We were scheduled for this same tour in March of 2020 and it was cancelled only just before we were to travel. And again in the Fall of 2020. We really hope that this time we will be able to make it. But only if the situation is safe. Fingers crossed.

Do we have options for a refund if tensions continue to deteriorate,
or transfer to different RS Tour.

tomt176 call the RS tour department to discuss this. My past experience is they are often able to accommodate changes, but it's going to be case-by-case and subject to the tour conditions you agreed to when signing up for the tour.

Ugh. NATO shot down an Iranian missile headed toward Turkey this morning.

I know an Emirates flight attendant. Emirates is flying a few flights, but she hasn’t been called to be on one yet and she prefers it that way. I don’t blame her. So far the flights are repatriation flights and not escape flights. Maybe 10 a day.

As for Turkey, of course NATO shot down a missile headed for Turkey. Turkey is in NATO, no telling the nationalities sitting in that Mediterranean anti-missile-whatever it was; might have been a Turk. My son is assigned to NATO and every room is full of every nationality.

As I mentioned above, we are scheduled for the March 16 tour. Our plans are to arrive in Istanbul this next Tuesday, March 10. So we have very little time to assess the ongoing situation. One thing I am doing in addition to checking with Rick Steves is to monitor my airline flying into Istanbul. We are on British Airways from London. Their website has a running information line about up to the minute changes since so many of their flights into the region are affected. I trust Rick Steves and I trust British Airways for their safety concerns. This is a rapidly changing situation and I believe that this tour will happen only if it is really safe. Our tour plans were cancelled twice in 2020 due to the pandemic. They did not hesitate to cancel when it appeared that it would have been unsafe to continue. And of course all funds were returned.
I welcome comments from any of those others on our (sold out) tour as to what they are thinking now.

We are planing to fly out of Newark, NJ on March 14 at 1:25 (am) on Turkish Airlines if they don't cancel the flight

Also watching the situation. My daughter and I will be on the match 29 tour. Fingers crossed.

I am also scheduled for the 3/16 tour. Leaving the 12th for Istanbul to get over jet lag before the tour starts. I am trusting that RS will cancel if they feel it’s necessary. Since our travels keep us in a different region I suspect we will still go but I also wonder more about flight and airspace issues. If RS does cancel I’m hoping they can just place me on same tour, different date. Also, if they cancel/reschedule, I fly into Frankfurt and out of Munich so I’ll just work with my airline and travel in Germany and Italy for a couple of weeks. We’ll see.

This is all good advice to trust your airline.and your tour operator to know when things are safe or not. As I said, Türkiye is a big country, and this missile qas intercepted near the Syrian border, which is well away from where the tour goes. Definitely keep watching the news (depressing thought it is...)

On the 3/29 -4/4 tour of Istanbul was planning to fly direct on Turkish Airlines from the U.S. on 3/25. This conflict is expanding.
There are 5, US military installations (Air Force I think) in Türkiye including one at Izmir (destination airport for Kusadasi/Ephesus).
I suggest travelers consult the UK’s Foreign Office advisory for travel to Türkiye, which rates the potential for terrorist activity in Istanbul and Ankara. Even if one could travel safely into the country, it might prove difficult to return home, we have daily proof of that, albeit in other cities (Doha, Dubai) . I don’t believe a ceasefire or peace or regime change will be achieved in 3-weeks time, and I don’t believe the U.S. State Department can be relied upon for trustworthy information: it has now jettisoned 20,000 U.S. travelers in the current conflict zones.

The UK FCDO does not warn against travel to Türkiye, apart from the area near the border with Syria, and there has been no change to the overall warning level for Türkiye since the conflict began.

Obviously everyone needs to be aware and keep an eye on news and travel warnings, but there's nothing specific that's changed.

Istanbul has not been impacted at all.