Petra

Early evening at the monastery after going up 900 steps on my donkey.

Monday November 19th
My taxi ride to Petra was really great. Something had happened to my driver, his English had improved dramatically. Maybe this guy was his twin brother. He was telling me about his family and the financial stress he was under having five girls. His wife was pregnant again and he was hoping for a boy. Now, he told me that he was 42 but  I think he was either lying, confused about numbers in English or had had a particularly hard life!

Above the  city of Petra with the Bedouin village to the right.

Just before Petra we stopped for this photo opportunity. He explained that below us was the ancient city , all carved and hidden within the rocks. I found out later that the village on the hill was the Bedouin village where the government in the 80s had permanently housed the cave dwellers of Petra. The King of Jordan had decreed that the lands  could only be used by the local Bedouin who see Petra as their ancestral home.
At this point though I knew nothing about this...In fact the only things on my mind were incredibly burnt gums and lips from drinking boiling hot coffee, and the fact that I was totally exhausted from my one hour sleep extravaganza the night before.
Anyway my driver turned out to be a  great guy. He ' recommended' a hotel to me and initially I just thought it was a commission scam for him. I was a bit rude when I asked him to show me EXACTLY how far it was from the visitor entrance to Petra, and no joke it really was less than 5 minutes away. (This was amazingly brilliant news as most hotels are an annoying hike up the hill into the town of Wadi Musa) Also it was far cheaper, as well as far nearer than the hotels I'd been looking at in my guide book.  To top it all off  it  was pretty swish too! I was really pleased and me and my first taxi driver in Jordan departed on good terms!!!( Even if the coffee he had bought me had probably blistered my oesophagus.)
First thing I did was have a shower to get rid of the sand from my desert experience. I then relaxed for a bit and tried to get my head around the delights which were awaiting me.

I started off my afternoon with a quick jaunt into the Movenpick Hotel right by the entrance. It had airport security but was worth it for the lovely icecream they sold.  Two big scoops of this numbed my burnt mouth enough for the adventure to begin!

Going into Petra in the afternoon was great. Due to the border being closed between Israel and Jordan  there were no Israeli based day trippers heading back to their  tour buses so I had the Siq walk all to myself. (I was so lucky to have made it over in time!) It was so impressive and was a great introduction to the city. It was a good twenty minute walk and the road is a natural rift in the rock caused by a massive Earthquake millions of years ago. The chasm gets narrower and narrower until finally the Treasury building appears through the gap!

Walking down the Siq is something I will never forget. The colours of the rocks were amazing and the ancient water pipes carrying the river water to the capital of the Nabateans were designed to perfection.

The ledges under the rock were for moving water around.
This photo wasn't taken by me. This was a far sunnier day!

As for the Treasury it was amazingly quiet and really beautiful.  It felt almost surreal, like I had entered another world.
The Treasury is just the beginning of the city and now the hours of walking and climbing around were about to commence!  Thank God it wasn't too hot.  Before I moved on I took a look inside...nothing but the smallest cave.   The Nabateans lived in them  (similar to the Bedouin ) and I was about to see hundreds!

Camels at the end of the Siq waiting to take tired tourists back to the entrance.

An ampitheatre carved out of the rock. Unbelievable.

A selection of caves.

   I wandered off through the Nabatean and Roman areas of the city reading the signs and trying to learn a bit about the history.  Nabateans were around at the time of the Greeks and Egyptians and they were merchants in Frankincense and Myrrh  Their city was mostly destroyed  in 106 AD by  a massive Earthquake and then ultimately in the fourth century once the Romans switched their trade routes to the sea.

There were coffee shops and stalls lining the pathways and a couple of lads were following me on their donkeys.  I knew I was far too knackered and also too late to climb the 900 steps to get up to the furthest and highest point of the Monastery, so when one of the guys said he would take me up on his donkey for 10 quid I agreed.

The guy was a cheeky chappie of 22 called Yaser and his lovely donkey was called Michael Jackson. Yes Michael Jackson.

Me on Michael

Yaser said this nut tree was really old.  How old... I can't say!

Yaser

Roman Road with the Nabatean tombs at the end. The entrance and the Siq is round the right corner.

So, off we went on our adventure. Me, Michael and Yaser. Yaser was lovely. He didn't stop chatting about life in the Bedouin village, how good Michael was and how life was really quiet at the moment because of the lack of Israeli day trippers. Good for me though!
 He made me laugh when he said that the day trippers from Jerusalem paid over 90 pounds for their day trip passes and most never got past the Treasury...they see the Siq and think that's it and then head back to the bus! ( I paid 55 pounds for a two day pass.)

Now being on Michael did make me nervous so unfortunately there are not so many photos and I did have to concentrate as we began the 900 step climb.  It was beautiful and really quiet. (Apart from Yaser telling me his life story.)  We stopped off at his Mother's stall and we had tea, pitta, yoghurt, tomoatoes, cucumbers and more tea.  His sister was there too and her English was amazing. Both her and the Mum were puffing on cigarettes like crazy but Yaser wasn't a smoker. Mum didn't really have a tooth in her head and seemed like she had been pickled in vinegar but she kept pulling food out of her bag and Yaser tucked in.  I bought some jewellery and then back I got onto Michael and we continued the climb!  I didn't take any photos of them..I just didn't want to turn their lives into a photo opportunity, it just didn't seem right.  About 4pm, just as the sun was beginning to go down we arrived at the top and I saw the Monastery.  It was a bigger and even more impressive version of the Treasury.

Michael's ears

Me at the Monastery

My favourite photo of the monastery.
 Shame you can't sense it's size!

View from the top of Petra.

We got chatting to a lovely girl from the States and had tea with her at the top.  Just me, her andYaser  and a couple of MAD local Bedouin who were JUMPING from column to column at the top of the Monastery.  Just the thought of this brings back the panic of watching them leap.  The gap was so large...so high.  Mental!  The American was living in the Bedouin village and wearing full Arab dress, she had learnt Arabic and seemed to be encompassing the lifestyle completely.  She was really lovely.  She said her family roots were Cherokee Indian and that the lifestyle here was the closest she had ever felt to the way her ancestors must have lived.  The way Yaser's Mum was puffing on those woodbines I could totally believe her! She locked up the coffee shop and we all walked down the steps.  This will be one of my most enduring memories of my trip, the beautiful light and stillness of this great place as the three of us walked down with our donkeys.

An amazing introduction to Petra and I haven't even written about my first evening yet!

The desert of Wadi Rum

I really can't believe I took this photo!  Just a few weeks ago I was here, in Wadi Rum.

Saturday 17th November was a really lazy day involving nothing much more than swimming, hours of snorkelling, reading and relaxing.  I needed it...it was great day.  So come Sunday morning I was rested and ready for further adventures.
I said goodbye to all the great people at the Arab Dive Village and ordered a taxi.  Within a couple of hours I was in Wadi Rum.  The taxi driver had pretty poor English but I didn't care I was just enjoying travelling in a car for a change and being able to stop off for coffee and photos whenever I wanted to.

We arrived at the entrance to Wadi Rum desert early afternoon and I was greeted by my rather slimy guide Fiasel.  I made it pretty obvious that I was old enough to be his Mother and also that I was 'married' with two teenage sons and he seemed to believe it.

Now, Wadi Rum was beautiful and even more so because there were dark, atmospheric clouds and very few tourists.   We drove around , just the two of us for a few hours and because I didn't linger in one place too much or want to go off for 'romantic' walks with him we managed to visit quite a few places.

People have since asked me if I was ever scared about being in a desert alone with a young Bedouin.  To be honest, call me naive, but I wasn't.  I knew he was working for a legitimate company and I really think he was just trying it on.  Once I had told him that I was NOT going to spend the afternoon/evening/night in his cave he just seemed to forget that he'd ever asked me to! Infact things changed direction and I felt perfectly OK once I had asked him to teach me a game of which the board was chiselled out on a rock.   We needed a few stones but he taught me the basics...of course he beat me.

I have no idea what this game was called.

Here are a few far more spectacular photos!

Love it!

The chicken and the egg rock.

Me!

The cave.  With more tourists around this would have been a fine place to hang out!

Rain in the desert is a rare joy to witness!


Rain in the distance.

A woman with her goats and a nearby camel.



Nabatean hyrogliphs...the people who inhabited Petra from about 300 BC.  they spoke an ancient form of Arabic.



Here is some 'ancient' art from the Nabateans too.  But to be honest I'm not sure if my guide was having a laugh when he pointed these out.  Yeah, really?!  I'll have to investigate further!

  Early evening we ended up at the tent where I was going to spend the night. There were luckily a few independent tourists there and I felt pretty relieved.

It was set up really well and the main tent was more like a hotel.  We had a great meal with chicken a cooked in a clay pot under the ground and a buffet salad.  Here are more pictures!

Inside the 'Main tent Headquarters'

Mark from Northumberland and a great couple from Brazil.  (Forgotten their names.)


Muhammed pulling out our dinner.

 Buffet style meal.   It was a classic experience!

My bedroom. Inside it seemed to be the size of a football pitch.

My bed

My evening in the desert was great.  Was lovely to chat to the Brazilian couple who were travelling the world and were the only two people I have every met who have managed to get both Israeli and Iranian stamps in their passports!  They had just come from Iran and were highly positive about the country.  My desire to go there has definitely not decreased (Sorry!)

Mark from Newcastle was great too.  He was one of those lucky people I meet on my trips...another word for them is travel angels!....Why, you ask?!!!   Well Mark for some unfathomable reason had 2 SLEEPING bags with him and kindly offered one to me.   Thank God.  Because that night I was bloody freezing, freaked and spooked and the only thing that kept me calm was the sleeping bag  right over my head.   More about that later!

Mark also had BINOCULARS so we were able to see the stars in a clarity I could hardly believe. They were amazing and the Milky Way was so clear along with the zillion-billion other terrestrial bodies.   It was totally breathtaking but my camera was just not up to the job of taking any decent photos.  I have never seen stars like I did that night.  We were so lucky that the clouds had vanished completely to give us such a clear view.

About 10pm I stumbled off to my tent.  Now I had had NO alcohol to give me courage, a great night's sleep the night before (hence I wasn't that tired) and a really fun day so I felt great... but now it was time to get TOTALLY SPOOKED.  My tent was massive, I was all alone with about 6 empty beds and an internal empty space that seemed to be growing and the wind was whistling through.  Once I had clambered into bed with loads of blankets and the invaluable sleeping bag to keep the bugs off me I  was just too freaked to even get out again.  I couldn't read, it was just too damn cold to even have your hand out of the bed and of course I didn't have any gloves! 

 I slept for about 1 hour maximum and I just spent all night thinking about ghosts/Jinn/Genies , which  many of my Arab student  have described to me in lots of detail over the years. I kept willing them to stay away from me and kept thinking about my great trip up to this point and what a great waste it would be for me to die or be possessed by evil spirits at this point in my trip!    It was awful.   Honestly it was the worst night of my entire trip!   I will NEVER sleep or rather attempt to sleep in the desert again!

About 6.30am I was so glad it was getting light and I crawled out of my cavernous tent feeling pretty grim but a cup of sage tea soon revived me and I managed to climb up a rock for sunrise and got chatting to a Mexican guy who enjoyed dressing up like a Bedouin and was obviously often mistaken for a local (apart from his grasp of Arabic!) 

Our  camp from the top of the rock which I was really proud that I climbed up in my knackered and freaked out state!  Unfortunately the sunrise wasn't that impressive due to the clouds.

The morning tea which revived my spirits! My outrageous imagination had been on overdrive that night.

About 8am we all got in the jeep and drove back to the main house in the village. 3 Japanese guys, 2 Brazilians and 2 Brits along with an Aussie volunteer. 

  I quickly sent an emergency text to my Mum to  tell her I was alive and posted a few photos on facebook to show that I had managed to dodge the bombs in Israel. Not being able to blog was making my Mum panic. I had only really heard about how bad things were in Israel from meeting the tourists that previous evening.  I had been so unbelievably lucky, being about 36-48 hours ahead of the troubles and travelling about in ignorant bliss. 

In the village my taxi driver was waiting for me ready to transport me in style to Petra.  I drank an extremely strong  and large coffee to keep me awake and my wits about me and then off we went.  The joys of Petra awaited!

Friday 16th November. FINALLY IN JORDAN

My last cup of coffee in Israel

Finally an Internet cafe with speedy connection.  This is my birthday treat this evening to type as fast as I can and catch up on my adventures!!
The crossing into Jordan was a breeze and rather funny.  I left about 10.30am from outside Eilat's crazy city centre airport and the taxi dropped me off in the middle of nowhere.  Just a border point.  It seemed like I was the only one going through...I paid my tax and the man checking my passport said to me.
 "You have a lovely smile, stay happy on your trip and have a nice birthday next week."  Wow, very different from my harsh welcome into the country!!

I walked through no man's land into Jordan, no one checked any of my bags and suddenly I saw a face I recognised...it was Scottish Daniella, who I met in Haifa,  and her boyfriend.  It was so ridiculously crazy!!!. We hugged and laughed and chatted and the border control men were waiting for us to finish so they could check and stamp our passports. She'd had a wet and windy holiday in Tsfat whilst I'd been blown and rained on in Jerusalem. The guards were laughing too and seemed really flummoxed that we were not rushing through the border checks!  For 5 minutes we talked about our adventures in no-man's land and then finally they got in a taxi to Petra and I got into a taxi for the Arab Dive Resort. We were the only three people going into Jordan at that time and it was a lovely welcome to the country!! It was a shame that we couldn't chat for longer but they only had a few days left in the country and were desperate to get to Petra, whereas I could take things a bit more leisurely.


I really felt like I had crossed into another world.  Better lay out of plants, trees and shrubs (In fact generally greener and far more low-key than brash Eilat.)  To be honest I felt there was a better understanding of the natural environment in which they were living and I felt comfortable. No more Russian and Romanian influenced stodgy food here!
  Israel was better than I thought it would be but often I felt I was just in any generic European country with brash and ugly edges.  Here I had finally arrived in the Middle East.
 Well, once I arrived at the Dive Centre Mourad persuaded me to go diving.  It wasn't busy there and this would be my only opportunity really to try it.  I was mad enough to give it a go and by 3pm I was 9 metres under the sea looking at all the fish and coral. I liked it actually and although my ears did hurt for about 24 hours afterwards it was worth it!

Thank you Safak for the photo.  She was a Turkish journalist staying in the same resort.

That evening I ate gorgeous fish cooked by the Bangladeshi guy there.  Now, Bangladeshi chefs are the kings of cooking fish and he was no exception! I got chatting to Richard, a guy from Devon who's wife had told him to go away on holiday for a week and grab some winter sun before Christmas kicked in. He was a interesting guy and he enjoyed chatting about his family and their mad adventure holidays they go on around the world.
Yes, a great day and I was so proud that I had managed to overcome a fear and that my head hadn't exploded into a million pieces.  OK, that night my  left ear was thumping in pain but by the morning the pain had luckily gone!