Our Story

Twenty Years of
Heritage Travel

Founded in 2006, Jewish Roots Travel has spent two decades exploring and researching the Jewish heritage of Central and Eastern Europe — combining scholarly depth with genuine personal devotion to this history.

Torah ark
Who We Are

Two Decades in the Field

Jewish Roots Travel was founded by Alex Grigorescu, who began leading Jewish heritage tours in Romania over twenty years ago. Starting in Bucharest, Moldavia, and Transylvania, he developed an intimate knowledge of the towns, synagogues, cemeteries, and archives that hold the memory of Romanian Jewry, building relationships with local communities and historians that no guidebook could replicate.

Over the years, Alex expanded his work across the region: into Hungary's great Hasidic heartlands, the shtetl landscapes of Moldova and Ukraine, the Carpathian communities of Slovakia, the storied cities of Poland, and further west to Austria, the Czech Republic, and Germany. Each country added new dimensions to his understanding of Jewish Central and Eastern European history — its richness, its tragedy, and its remarkable resilience.

Today, Jewish Roots Travel brings that depth of experience to every journey. Whether you are tracing your family name in a Galician archive or walking the streets of pre-war Czernowitz, you travel with someone who has dedicated his professional life to knowing these places — and to sharing them with honesty and care.

20+
Years of experience
9
Countries covered
1000+
Travelers guided
What We Stand For

Our Guiding Principles

Every decision we make — from how we select guides to how we design itineraries — flows from a small set of deeply held values.

✡
Depth Over Breadth
We believe in slowing down. Rather than rushing through famous sites, we linger where the stories live — in small towns, in archives, in conversations with community members who remember.
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Rigorous Expertise
Our guides don't simply describe a place — they bring it to life with context, nuance, and honest complexity.
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Dignified Travel
Heritage sites are not tourist attractions. We visit with respect, observe appropriate customs, support local Jewish communities, and ensure our presence contributes rather than extracts.
The People Behind JRT

Meet Alex Grigorescu

Jewish Roots Travel is led by Alex Grigorescu and his team of travel experts — local guides, historians, and genealogists across nine countries. Not a corporate product, but a lifelong calling.

Alex Grigorescu — Founder of Jewish Roots Travel
Alex Grigorescu
Founder & Lead Guide

Alex has been leading Jewish heritage tours in Romania for over twenty years — making him one of the longest-serving guides in this specialized field in the region. What began as a deep personal engagement with Romanian Jewish history grew into a comprehensive practice spanning nine countries.

His knowledge is not academic at a distance: it is built from hundreds of visits to communities across Romania, Hungary, Moldova, Ukraine, Slovakia, Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic, and Germany. He knows which archives hold which records, which cemeteries have been restored and which remain hidden in forests, and which local contacts can open doors that no organized tour could reach.

Alex has spent years working in Romanian civil, community and state archives, and has conducted archival research and fieldwork in Romania for several episodes of the PBS series Finding Your Roots. That same archival work underpins every Jewish Roots Travel itinerary. Before you travel, we trace where your family lived, worshipped and worked, so that together with our local expert guides and historians, you walk the streets that appear in your own family's records.

He has also written for the literary magazine Lettre International and is a longtime collaborator of Romania’s national public radio, the country’s equivalent of NPR.

When you travel with Jewish Roots Travel, you will benefit from the full weight of his experience, the knowledge of his team of travel experts, and their shared commitment to treating this history with the seriousness it deserves.

How We Work

A Different Kind of Heritage Tour

We've designed every element of the JRT experience with intention — from group sizes to pre-tour research to the way we engage with local communities.

  • 01
    Small Groups, Always Our tours are capped at 16 participants. This allows for meaningful conversation, flexible itineraries, and access to intimate spaces that larger groups cannot enter.
  • 02
    Pre-Tour Genealogical Research Before you travel, our researchers work with your family history to identify relevant archives, cemeteries, towns, and documents — making your journey deeply personal.
  • 03
    Community-First Partnerships We work with local Jewish communities and cultural organizations at every destination — ensuring your presence has a positive impact.
  • 04
    Seamless Logistics Private transportation, hand-picked accommodation, curated dining, and dedicated support from the moment you land to the moment you depart.
Jewish cemetery in Bucharest Dorohoi heritage site Jewish Museum
Begin Your Journey

Ready to Reconnect with Your Roots?

Explore our upcoming group tours, or reach out to discuss a private heritage journey designed entirely around your family's story.

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