AMMAN
The airport in Amman was one of the best we
had been to on our trip; instant visa on arrival with a fast track straight to
our bags and out into the hot desert air. We grabbed a taxi and headed to our
hotel without a hitch.
Jordan was vastly different to the rest of
the countries we had experienced in the Middle East. The buildings were a pearl
white that sprawled across the hills. The streets were tidy and the people
extremely friendly.
We arrived at our hotel that we had booked
in December and checked in. We dumped the bags in the room and headed out to
explore the area. The hunt for our trusted kebab fix was on. We finally found a
little joint nearby and sat down on the stairs of a sunny alley to fill the
endless void in our stomachs. We wandered around a little longer and then
headed back to the hotel to tog up.
Our next mission was the Dead Sea. After
bartering a ride with a taxi outside the hotel we clambered in and shot through
the city and desert to the border of Israel and Jordan. The little resort we
went to was right on the water side and had pools as well as it’s own beach to
swim/float in the Dead Sea. Without wasting a minute we went down to the
water’s edge to tick off a bucket list item.
As soon as we all jumped in we
erupted with laughter. It was the weirdest and most unusual feeling to jump
into the sea and float straight to the top. It was as if we were floating on an
inflatable mattress. Our legs refused to stay und the water and would shoot
right to the top leaving us no choice but to lie on our backs. Other people were floating around reading
newspapers and books, the experience was bizarre and one we will never forget.
What was also bizarre was that a few miles down the road was the violence of
Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
After trolling in the sea we got out to try
the pools on for size. After floating the the Dead Sea, we felt like whales
sinking in the normal salt-less water of the swimming pools. With the sun
setting we decided to head back to the hotel and load up on food before a good
nights sleep.
The next day we met our driver who would be
with us for the entirety of our Jordan trip. He was a nice guy with extremely
odd and dated music taste. We headed to the ancient Roman ruins of Jerash.
The ruin site was massive and Amman was
built around the original site. The city of Jerash was founded around 5000
years ago making it one of the older cities of human civilization. We had a
little trouble with the other tourists there as it was girl day at the ruins
and hundreds of school girls were throughout the ruins. We had many following
us asking for photos and wanting to know where we were from. It was cute but
got as old as the ruins as we were there for a history lesson and not an
autograph signing.
The old roads in the city were still there
and you could see where the old chariots used to travel through by the marks
still on the stones under foot. The columns of Jerash were fascinating as they
were moving and had been moving for thousands of years. When you look at them they
are still but one local put a spoon in the join of the pillar and the
foundation stone. The wedged spoon started moving up and down with the motions
of the swaying pillar.
We spent the good half of the day wandering around the
rest of the city before meeting back up with our driver to carry on with our
adventure.
Our driver dropped us off at the Larsa
Hotel where we dumped our gear and went exploring again. We headed over to the
surprisingly western mall to get food (yet again) and supplies for our long
drive through the desert the next day. We wandered back through the night and
felt quite safe walking the empty streets at night.
The next morning we woke up bright and
early and packed our gear into the car to head out to the desert. Our driver’s
music was super loud but entertaining. When Aqua’s Barbie girl came on we all
started laughing but the driver seemed to legitimately like the song.
The Jordanian desert was not like what we
imagined, There was grass and the hills were green with life. We could see how
you could settle here back in the day as the place was very habitable, unlike
the western deserts of Egypt.
WADI RUM
When we got close to Wadi Rum we noticed
the landscape change almost instantly. The sand was fine and red and the desert
was littered with huge rock mesas that scattered as far as we could see.
We finally came to the desert camp where we
found our tent and dumped the gear. There was no time to lose as we linked up
with another driver who would be taking us through Wadi Rum on a 4WD mission.
Our driver was probably 14-15 years old which would have made us nervous at the
start of our Asia trip but now we weren’t even surprised. We climbed onto the
back of the pick up and fanged it out into the midst of the mesas.
Our first stop was at a camp at the base of
a huge dune. We met the locals there and went exploring while they made tea. We
found a puppy that seemed super friendly and played with us on the dune while
we climbed the rocks and threw sticks for him to fetch.
After snapping some shots we sprinted down
the hill with the puppy like little kids to get our apple teas. Tea with the
Jordanians wasn’t quite like tea with the English. They pulled out their guns
and a few swords and started waving them around and laughing. We nervously
joined in and they seemed friendly enough so we got some pictures. We said
goodbye to the crazy Arabs and the cute pupy and saddled up on the pickup truck
once again to continue on.
The drive was insane and we agreed that
there was no place like this in the world. We never imagined that a bunch of
rocks in the desert could be described as beautiful but that’s what we
concluded.
Our driver took us to the famous rock with
the face of Lawrence of Arabia carved into it. We snapped a few photos in the
huge canyon and bypassed some fat white tourists to get out to the mesa where
the desert sun was setting.
We pulled up and loaded out to begin our rock
climbing mission to get the best view of the last sunset of our trip. We had
the area to ourselves and witnessed the sun drop over the desert.
A truly
magical place that we would recommend anyone to explore. We headed back to have
our desert dinner cooked exactly like the Maori hungi and listen to some live
Middle Eastern music before retiring to the tent.
The next morning was another early wake up
to catch the sunrise. So naturally we loaded up on some camels and headed out
of the camp to see the same sun we saw set the night before, come up over Wadi
Rum.
The camels were extremely uncomfortable and
the ride was nothing like the Mongolian camels we had experienced a few months
before. The sunrise made up for all of that and we took a few more snaps while
breathing in some of the freshest air of the trip.
We clunked our way back to
camp on the camels to load up the car for another 90’s driven music fest road
trip to the most anticipated Petra.
PETRA
After a few hours we arrived at the city of
Petra where we dumped the bags and headed out without a moment to lose. It was
still early in the day so we had a good amount of time to explore the ruins of
Petra.
We got through the wave of tourism shops
(one being the Indiana Jones shop) to meet our local guide for our walk through
the ancient ruins. There were horses riding everywhere and we were looking out
for the fast horse drawn buggies that sped past us on the old roman built road.
We entered the canyon that would take us
into the old city and were amazed to see well built roads and even a drainage
system that the old civilizations (Nabataeans) used to transport water. The
canyon led us down hill for a great deal of time before coming out to the great
and famous cliff carving of Petra. The experience was almost cinematic as the
carving is naturally revealed to us as we came around the corner.
The large amount of tourists there was a
little annoying but nothing would ruin this for us. We took some photos and
found out that there was much more to Petra than this one carved wall. We moved
on and left our local guide behind as we explored more and more wall carvings
and old temples throughout the canyons of the ancient city.
We spent the day exploring and hiking
through the mountains and rock formations of the old city. We heard about
another cliff carving similar to the famous one at the top of the mountain so
we made it our mission. The old rock stairs made an easier climb but the hot
desert sun keep us pouring water down the throat.
We heard at least three Kiwi
accents from different people as we climbed making us feel at home little. We
finally came to the top where we found an amazing carving and an even more
amazing view. We spent a good amount of time here sitting on the rocks looking
out over the canyons.
After a good while we began our decent and
our long haul back to the modern city where we stacked our stomachs full once
again with chicken. After which we headed to the hotel ignoring the trinkets to
chill out, shower up and watch a movie before sleeping off the epic day we just
filled to the brim.
This marked the end of our epic trip and we
saddled up for one last blast through the desert to the airport back in Amman.
After the long drive we were happy ready ourselves for the trip home. We said
farewell to the driver and the amazing country and boarded our plane back home.
Delays and bad layovers would stop us once again
but favour us with a stop over in Abu Dhabi where we settled in another high
end executive hotel. It was a nice treat for us after slugging our way through
the half year trip and accomplishing everything that we had wanted.
Early mornings: 4
Times listened to Barbie girl song: 7
Photo requests by locals: 5
