Flashback Friday

Our weekend in Jordan reigns as one of our most loved weekends of the past 3 years.  We were living in Tunisia that summer, in the time just before the world was watching this small Northern African country.  We took an extra day and met up with some of the team from Egypt for one very hot, but also very, very cool weekend. 

With everything going on in this region of the world now, I’m even more grateful we got to go when we did…

 JORDAN

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

 

Jules had to take a vacation day for us to make the trip work. We left on Thursday and arrived very late that evening after a layover in Istanbul. We met up with the guys from the Egypt team after breakfast the next morning and set off for Petra.

Jordan’s crown jewel and most visited site, Petra is on every “must-see before you die” list. It was built over 2000 years ago by the Nabataeans, an ancient Arab tribe, who controlled the region’s trade routes. It is massive, it is astonishing, it is laden with jaw-dropping beauty and mystique.

You begin your journey with a decent walk to the As-Siq, the main entrance to Petra. The As-Siq is a narrow and deep gorge with walls soaring over 250 feet tall and is about three-quarters of a mile long. The formations, the patterns, the colors- it is truly other-worldly in its beauty.…

As you reach the end of the As-Siq you get your first glimpse of Petra’s most famous monument, the Treasury…

It was originally a tomb built in the 1st century for an important Nabataean king and later was used as a temple. It is beauty carved out of beauty…

After the Treasury you continue on through the street of facades, to the theater and colonnaded street. Everywhere you turn you are blown away by the awesomeness that is the remains of this once thriving city…

We had all agreed if time permitted that we would try to make our way to the Monastery. I knew from reviews and Frenchie that the climb up was intense. Taking my ankle, the Wife’s newly painful heel, our empty stomachs and dehydrated bodies into consideration we hired donkeys to take us to the top. It halved our journey time to only 20 minutes and had I not been busy steering my donkey from the edge of a cliff and from taking out other tourists I would have taken photos. Apologies to the one lady I didn’t see who got the full-throttle donkey head-butt.

We still had a bit of a hike up to get to the top after the donkey’s dropped us off. After feeling like I couldn’t take another steep step, I knew we had made the right decision to take the donkeys. We also made the right decision to go up to the Monastery…

Exhausted we bucked up for the last hike up to get an even better view…

The close to 4 mile walk back was tough. I’m so glad we got to see the Treasury in a different light and without so many tourists…

But, really it was a tough walk back and the 3 hour van ride back to Amman wasn’t too much fun either. HOWEVER- it was so worth it. It was all so worth it and I would have driven twice as far and walked twice the distance to see this incredible place.

Saturday we visited the city of Madaba, which is known for its mosaics. Unfortunately, we had no idea where any of them were located so we only saw the one of the holy land located in a little Greek Orthodox Church. We then went to Mt. Nebo. Of epic biblical importance, this is where Moses first saw the promise land as well as where he died. The site is maintained by an order of Franciscan monks and also contains some large and impressive mosaics, a small museum and a church. During winter days when there’s no haze you can see all the way to Jerusalem. With it being summer there wasn’t much of a view and the church was closed for repair, so our trip up was fairly short-lived.
We then made our way down to the Dead Sea. When I say down, I mean down- the Dead Sea is the lowest point in the world. It is also 4 times saltier than our oceans, hence the “dead” part. Nothing but a few microorganisms can actually survive in it.

The real fascination with the Dead Sea, or at least our interest in going, is that you cannot sink. The hypersalinic water is so viscous you just bob like a balloon on top. Really. It was so bizarre to be able to stay afloat with no effort whatsoever.

Look Mom, no hands!! Or feet!!

You had to make a bit of an effort to even get your legs down from the surface, but once down there you could literally stand in the water. It’s a wild experience and even more so when we got into the pool and sank like stones.
The guys had to leave for Egypt that evening, so after an early dinner we said our goodbyes. It’s always so strange saying goodbye, not knowing if you’ll see each other again until January.

We were up way before the sun on Sunday to catch our two flights back to Tunisia. Only 2 weeks left before we are Europe bound! This weekend we’re keeping our feet on the ground and driving south to a beach resort town here in Tunisia. I’ve got to get some sun on these legs- they haven’t seen the light of day since we left Costa Rica.