Degania Bet Kibbutz Country Lodging

Our friendly guide Uvi showed us some of the 1500 acres of the kibbutz. The view of the sea is beautiful and our meal was very delicious. We did not stay int he hotel but based on everything else I would expect it to be very good.

Overall this is an interesting set up for a hotel - located on one of the oldest Kibbutzs in Israel right by the Sea of Galilee and a lot of holy sites. The staff are very friendly and the green areas around the room are great. The only reason that I didn't give it 5 stars is because I found the beds very hard. Maybe others wouldn't have this issue.

Facilities at Degania Bet were just ok; but their front office was unreasonable, confrontational, and acted in violation of the letter and spirit of Israel’s taxing law. Israel collects a room tax that Israeli citizens pay for a room they book; it’s by the room, not by the person.  But Degania Bet did an end-run around Israel’s system by insisting that the Israeli will pay the room tax, in a room that was booked by an American citizen. In the SAME room, one person paid the full 17% tax and one didn't! Degania Bet fought us over this at rock-concert volume for quite some time during check-in and again at checkout. After we left, they canceled my reservation with Booking so I won't be able to post this review on the Booking site! Furthermore they’ve “Declined” my credit card AFTER the charges went through 5 days prior to my arrival only so I could not prove to Booking that I was there. Booking can’t do anything since the booking was “canceled” and my credit card was “declined” after they got their money. I’ve never encountered such an outrageous effort to circumvent a country’s taxing law, and cover their tracks in a fraudulent way, by an avaricious host.  I’ll never stay there again and don’t suggest anyone else support highway robbery.  Degania Bet, being in the hospitality industry, needs to follow the rules of that industry and treat guests honestly. On the positive side, the surrounding is beautiful!

The lodgings are simple and clean. We had the "deluxe" rooms. We had an extended family holiday (21 people). Our rooms were all ground level, one next to the other (see photos of delux rooms). There were little cots for babies, family rooms for parents and kids, fridge, microwave, electric kettle. It was really well suited to our needs. We were not looking for anything fancy. The pool was excellent, a large wading pool as well. There was a playground, coffee shop, bakery, chocolaterie, and small byt good supermarket. Breakfast is included and was fine, lots of salads, eggs, pancakes, cakes, coffee could be better if they had an espresso machine etc. My only complaint was the extremely rude message thread between myself and someone via fb messenger; prior to our arrival I wrote to ask for certain recommendations and the conversation thread was rather shocking in its utter rudeness. I nearly cancelled the entire long weekend of 21 guests. But other than that, everything was nice.