darthintel
Member
I will be traveling to Israel soon and wanted to see if anyone knows where I could buy Olive wood pen blanks while I'm there .
Olive Wood in Israel
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Dan Masshardt
Member
Probably lots of places. There are lots of carving / gift shops around.
Get some for me too
Get some for me too
BJohn
Member
There is a young lady from Isreal that is really active here on the forum, matter of fact she shows up on the memberships map (link at top of page).
If I were you I would send here a PM and ask.
I did a similar thing when I went Hawaii and not only found some great wood but made a friend also.
If I were you I would send here a PM and ask.
I did a similar thing when I went Hawaii and not only found some great wood but made a friend also.
its_virgil
Member
https://www.bethlehemolivewood.net if you are going to Bethlehem. If not, contact the and see if they can help you find a source.
Don
Don
OK, I'm going to tell a little story - it may or may not be helpful, but here goes.
I made a business trip to Israel in Sep 2012 - this was about 4 months before I got into pen turning and I was not at all familiar with olive wood at the time. However a pen turning friend asked me to try to bring him some small pieces of olive wood, and I told him that I would try.
I spent most of my time in the Tel Aviv area and never found any place to buy olive wood - there might well be some good sources there, but I wasn't sure where to look and my business colleagues in Tel Aviv had no suggestions either.
I did have a free weekend, so I was able to spend 3 days & 4 nights in Jerusalem. Near the end of my first day there, I happened to find a very helpful taxi driver. We chatted a while and I wound up booking him for the entire next day. He picked me up at my hotel in Jerusalem the next morning and we spent the day touring the West Bank. We spent a good bit of time in Bethlehem, and also toured the Herodium, the Dead Sea and Jericho and got back to Jerusalem in time to watch the sun set over the old city from atop the Mount of Olives.
I mention all that just to point out that there would have been no way to experience so much of the great West Bank sites without a personal guide, so that's something to consider.
We started out at the Herodium & then went to Bethlehem. He first took me to Johnny's Gift Shop - I loved the place. Lots of carved items, beautiful jewelry and many other items - some very expensive but also a lot of inexpensive items. I spent a couple of hours shopping there and took care of a good bit of my Christmas shopping for that year in just that short time. Johnny has several licensed guides working for him and he got one of them to take me to the Church of the Nativity for a personal tour. We were able to bypass the lines of tourists who came in by bus tours to go to all the special places in the church. I got to see & do everything that folks go to the Church of the Nativity for in about 30 minutes while most people wind up spending a half day or more because they have to wait in lines. There was no charge for this guide service, but I did give my guide a nice tip. (undoubtedly the taxi driver also gets a commission from Johnny for bringing visitors to his shop, but that's ok too - the Palestinian Christian community in Bethlehem is very close knit and works together to help each other out. I was glad that I was able to help several families out that day and I had a number of nice treasures to bring back home.)
I told my taxi driver & Johnny that I wanted to buy some olive wood and asked them if they could help me out. It took a while to explain what I wanted and why - even though they spoke fairly good English, they had some difficulty comprehending what I wanted. Finally we got directions to the workshop of Munir Twemeh & this was a real treat. He is probably the greatest wood carving artist in Israel - I had purchased one of his nice pieces at Johnny's so I really enjoyed getting to meet him and watch him work for a little while. Unfortunately, he only had a few small pieces of wood on hand at the time, but he did give us directions to the shop of another carver. This man had a much larger shop and he had a big stack of olive wood limbs in the back of his shop. He let me select whatever I wanted, so I picked out about 20 pounds of wood. He charged me $200 for it - I didn't know if that was a good price or not, but I didn't have time to run all over Israel looking for more. My friend was quite happy with it, so it all worked out ok.
So, now that I've had that experience and also have a much better appreciations for olive wood, here's what I plan to do if I ever get a chance to go back:
1. Try to make contact with other IAP members in Israel and see if they might be able to help me find some good sources of olive wood. (use the advanced member search to find members in Israel - it looks like we have 14 members, but only a couple of them are currently active).
2. Do some research and try to find olive wood sources in whatever part of the country you will be spending the most time. I didn't do any prior research last time and we were quite busy most of the time, so my colleagues didn't really have time to help me hunt for wood. If I had asked them about it a few weeks before my trip, they could probably have helped me out more.
3. Bethlehemolivewood.net has already been suggested & they are located in Jerusalem. I would definitely check them out & see if I can visit. Another possible source in Jerusalem is ebay seller olivewood2000 - I have purchased a number of pen blanks from him and have always gotten good quality. He is in Jerusalem also. Getting around in Jerusalem is no problem. I had a rental car and drove all over the country by myself, but I did not attempt to drive in the West Bank alone. I would not recommend that - either use a tour bus or a personal guide like I did if you want to go into any West Bank areas. A personal guide is certainly more expensive, but you can go where you want on your own schedule and see & do a lot more.
4. Pack light or just take older clothes on the trip & throw some of it away to make room for wood. Buy as much olive wood as you can and pack your suitcases up to the weight limit. Sure, buy some pen blanks, but get as much larger wood as you can, especially some with bark for natural edge projects. You will probably need to visit the shops of some carvers like I did to get that kind of choice wood. If you can, try to arrange such visits in advance - I really lucked into the opportunities I had. Prior planning would have been much better, but at the time, I had no knowledge of wood turning whatsoever.
Hope this helps - enjoy your trip.
Edgar
I made a business trip to Israel in Sep 2012 - this was about 4 months before I got into pen turning and I was not at all familiar with olive wood at the time. However a pen turning friend asked me to try to bring him some small pieces of olive wood, and I told him that I would try.
I spent most of my time in the Tel Aviv area and never found any place to buy olive wood - there might well be some good sources there, but I wasn't sure where to look and my business colleagues in Tel Aviv had no suggestions either.
I did have a free weekend, so I was able to spend 3 days & 4 nights in Jerusalem. Near the end of my first day there, I happened to find a very helpful taxi driver. We chatted a while and I wound up booking him for the entire next day. He picked me up at my hotel in Jerusalem the next morning and we spent the day touring the West Bank. We spent a good bit of time in Bethlehem, and also toured the Herodium, the Dead Sea and Jericho and got back to Jerusalem in time to watch the sun set over the old city from atop the Mount of Olives.
I mention all that just to point out that there would have been no way to experience so much of the great West Bank sites without a personal guide, so that's something to consider.
We started out at the Herodium & then went to Bethlehem. He first took me to Johnny's Gift Shop - I loved the place. Lots of carved items, beautiful jewelry and many other items - some very expensive but also a lot of inexpensive items. I spent a couple of hours shopping there and took care of a good bit of my Christmas shopping for that year in just that short time. Johnny has several licensed guides working for him and he got one of them to take me to the Church of the Nativity for a personal tour. We were able to bypass the lines of tourists who came in by bus tours to go to all the special places in the church. I got to see & do everything that folks go to the Church of the Nativity for in about 30 minutes while most people wind up spending a half day or more because they have to wait in lines. There was no charge for this guide service, but I did give my guide a nice tip. (undoubtedly the taxi driver also gets a commission from Johnny for bringing visitors to his shop, but that's ok too - the Palestinian Christian community in Bethlehem is very close knit and works together to help each other out. I was glad that I was able to help several families out that day and I had a number of nice treasures to bring back home.)
I told my taxi driver & Johnny that I wanted to buy some olive wood and asked them if they could help me out. It took a while to explain what I wanted and why - even though they spoke fairly good English, they had some difficulty comprehending what I wanted. Finally we got directions to the workshop of Munir Twemeh & this was a real treat. He is probably the greatest wood carving artist in Israel - I had purchased one of his nice pieces at Johnny's so I really enjoyed getting to meet him and watch him work for a little while. Unfortunately, he only had a few small pieces of wood on hand at the time, but he did give us directions to the shop of another carver. This man had a much larger shop and he had a big stack of olive wood limbs in the back of his shop. He let me select whatever I wanted, so I picked out about 20 pounds of wood. He charged me $200 for it - I didn't know if that was a good price or not, but I didn't have time to run all over Israel looking for more. My friend was quite happy with it, so it all worked out ok.
So, now that I've had that experience and also have a much better appreciations for olive wood, here's what I plan to do if I ever get a chance to go back:
1. Try to make contact with other IAP members in Israel and see if they might be able to help me find some good sources of olive wood. (use the advanced member search to find members in Israel - it looks like we have 14 members, but only a couple of them are currently active).
2. Do some research and try to find olive wood sources in whatever part of the country you will be spending the most time. I didn't do any prior research last time and we were quite busy most of the time, so my colleagues didn't really have time to help me hunt for wood. If I had asked them about it a few weeks before my trip, they could probably have helped me out more.
3. Bethlehemolivewood.net has already been suggested & they are located in Jerusalem. I would definitely check them out & see if I can visit. Another possible source in Jerusalem is ebay seller olivewood2000 - I have purchased a number of pen blanks from him and have always gotten good quality. He is in Jerusalem also. Getting around in Jerusalem is no problem. I had a rental car and drove all over the country by myself, but I did not attempt to drive in the West Bank alone. I would not recommend that - either use a tour bus or a personal guide like I did if you want to go into any West Bank areas. A personal guide is certainly more expensive, but you can go where you want on your own schedule and see & do a lot more.
4. Pack light or just take older clothes on the trip & throw some of it away to make room for wood. Buy as much olive wood as you can and pack your suitcases up to the weight limit. Sure, buy some pen blanks, but get as much larger wood as you can, especially some with bark for natural edge projects. You will probably need to visit the shops of some carvers like I did to get that kind of choice wood. If you can, try to arrange such visits in advance - I really lucked into the opportunities I had. Prior planning would have been much better, but at the time, I had no knowledge of wood turning whatsoever.
Hope this helps - enjoy your trip.
Edgar
Lucky2
Member
Rick, you should make sure that there will be no problems bringing green wood back into the country. It would be terrible to buy the wood, just to lose it to the authorities.
Len
Len
That is certainly something to consider. To be completely safe, you should have green wood chemically or heat treated to make sure the wood is free from insects (especially if it has bark attached). Be sure you get a treatment certificate to show the customs agent in case your luggage is inspected.
I've brought green wood back from Israel and Trinidad & Tobago without doing that though and had no problems. The main thing is to make sure that the wood is clean and there are no obvious signs of insects. Chances are they won't even look in your bags or if they do and it looks clean they will let it go. But, there are always those agents who insist on going by the books....
The Penguin
Member
I've heard that on customs forms, you might not want to say anything about "pieces of wood" - but instead call it "wood art"
I've heard that on customs forms, you might not want to say anything about "pieces of wood" - but instead call it "wood art"
When I returned from Israel, I did call my wood "wood art & samples", but now, if you re-enter at an airport with the new automated kiosks, it's even easier. You no longer have to fill out the paper form at those airports - you walk up to a kiosk, scan your passport & answer a few questions - like no fruit, vegetables, plants, soil, etc. You no longer have to declare individual items & there are no questions about wood. It only takes a few seconds to do all this & it prints a receipt for you to give the customs agent.
TellicoTurning
Member
I haven't been out of the country or dealt with U.S.Customs or the Dept of Agriculture in over 10 years and knowing that customs regs are in a constant state of flux, my information may be way out of date. There used to be a form required for all vegetable and animal imports called a PhytoSanitary Certificate. Don't know if it's still required or not.
When I was last involved with imports, actual inspections were often random.
When I was last involved with imports, actual inspections were often random.
Yes, fruit, vegs, animal & agriculture products and soil must be declared & if you have them, you do need the cert. Wood is not on any of the questions - I suppose it could be considered an agricultural product, but it's not clear so I simply check no on all those questions.
If you re-enter at an airport with the new kiosks, the process is very simple - no declarations other than those few questions. Odds are very high they won't even look in your bags.
Still good insurance to get green wood treated & have a cert available just in case - particularly if you are bringing back a significant amount of wood.
If you re-enter at an airport with the new kiosks, the process is very simple - no declarations other than those few questions. Odds are very high they won't even look in your bags.
Still good insurance to get green wood treated & have a cert available just in case - particularly if you are bringing back a significant amount of wood.
BJohn
Member
Why Carry it, just have it shipped. Just box it up go to a local post office. So much easier then carrying on plane or dealing with what ever government agency at the airport. Even with the kiosk's I am sure they randomly check folks. So why worry about telling an untruth and having problem's. I am sure the last line in your declaration.
Goes something like the above information is correct and if not there is some law you can be punished under.
That wood is shipped here every day, just mail it.
Goes something like the above information is correct and if not there is some law you can be punished under.
That wood is shipped here every day, just mail it.