McGuire's of Arabia: Jordan Part 2

Jamie did the first part of the trip, so I get to talk about the 2nd part (which was also our favorite part). We were thrilled to leave our cheap hostel in Amman and took a day to drive the King's Highway down to Petra. Our driver was amazing and always stopped to let us take pictures and even bought us falafal sandwiches for breakfast. The King's Highway is full of awesome sights! We were able to see Karak and Shobak castles. Both were used as crusaders castle, but taken over around 1180 AD. Karak is still in pretty good condition, but Shobak had more personality and mystery about it. There is one spot in Shobak where you can do down some steps, which go down and down and down. Eventually you loose the steps it becomes more of a sandy slope. The scary thing was that there is no natural lighting down there. All we had was one flashlight! It was terrifying and although Jamie wanted to try to make it to the underground stream at the bottom, I freaked out. He was a loving husband and turned around with me, and even let me hold the flashlight on the way out. We also stopped and took pictures at two different Wadis (valleys). Wadi Mujib was beautiful and is considered the "Grand Canyon of Jordan". The scenery was also gorgeous at the Dana Nature Preserve. We didn't have time to do any hiking, but would like to go back next summer and spend a day there. Animals aren't abundant in Jordan, but Dana has quite a few including some endangered species. We made it safely to Wadi Musa (the city where you stay if you are going to Petra) and found out that our hostel here was better, but chilly!

We only allotted ourselves one day for Petra which I wouldn't suggest most people do. We shoved as much into that day as we could before our legs decided to stop working. Here is a quick history of Petra. Petra was built by the Nabataean people around more than 2000 years ago. It means "rock" and was named because the structures left standing are carved out of the rock mountains. The Nabataens controlled much of the trade that came through the area and thrived because of it. Petra was everything we expected it to be. The walk through the Siq was amazingly beautiful and ended with a spectacular showing of the famous Treasury. The Treasury was neat, but the Monastery was even more impressive. Some of you might recognize it from Transformers 2. We also saw the High Place of Sacrifice where there are still stone alters, complete with a spot for blood to drain from the animal sacrifices. Now, you have to understand that both the Monastery and High Place are very high and the climbs up to them were exhausting. We figure that we ended up walking about 10 miles (1/2 of it being vertical) in about 8 hours. We decided to end the day with a drink at the Cave Bar which is a bar located inside a Nabatean tomb and a fabulous dinner.

Our last big day was spent in Wadi Rum with the Bedouin people. The Bedouin's are the desert experts. We had a guide, Audi, who took us scrambling for most of the day. Scrambling is a combination of hiking and climbing with an emphasis on the climbing. Being young, he expected us to be fast, but we were pretty sore and tired from the day in Petra. We went to Jebel Burdah and climbed up to a rock bridge that was quite high. Audi made us a traditional Bedouin lunch of a tomato/bean soup, hummus, and bread. We also went to a second rock bridge, Lawrence of Arabia's house/ruins, and watched the sunset across the Wadi. The weather was perfect and we had a great time doing nontraditional touristy things for a day. That night we slept in a "tent" made of wool. It sounds more rustic than it actually was. It was freezing that night, but they made sure we had lots of blankets. The most amazing sight that day for me was the night sky. I've seen lots of stars, but there are no lights anywhere near where we were staying and the sky was spectacular. It was the first time we've really been able to see the night sky in this part of the world. I wish we could have taken pictures, but that just wouldn't have worked well.

The last two days of our trip were spent traveling back to Madaba which is near the airport. We decided to stay in Madaba instead of Amman because it was a cute, quiet town. We even splurged and got a nicer hotel. We honestly didn't do much of anything, just ate, watched movies in our room, and walked around town.

Overall, our trip was fantastic. We would love to go back and do the things we didn't have time for, but are glad to be back home for now. School has started up again and it's nice to get back into a routine.

Tara

Here are a few pictures of our trip: