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!