I would have to say Jordan was the most wonderful surprise of the trip. After being in Egypt, I just assumed the people and the cities would be very similar, but not at all. I didn’t feel the rush or the pressure as I did in Egypt, not worrying whether or not I was paying a fare price or if I would be asked for money from a nice gentlemen who decided to strike up conversation with me.
We decided to rent a car in Jordan, we are slowly realizing we are car travelers. I think we like the independence, but also Alan and I both grew up doing a lot of road trips with our parents as well, so I wonder if was home grown. Because of the cost of Jordan, we decided we could only stay a few days. So we rented the car from Aqaba, Jordan and drove the highway next to the Dead Sea. We hardly saw anyone on the road, only a few people at bus stops and look out towers, with Isreal only a few kilometers away. We also saw lots of shepherds with their sheep…lots and lots of sheep. Sometimes you would be waiting 20 minutes from the sheep to cross the road.
We ended up almost to Amman but decided to go the where Moses saw the Promise Land. It was gorgeous and really cool to be able to see all the way into Isreal. After Alan showed me the the Promise Land, we began to drive toward this amazing place called Colored Canyon…it is the Grand Canyon of Jordan. It was gorgeous….and very, very windy. We drove a lot of it at night and was the most incredible sunset, then camped out near by to wake up to the beautiful view.
After taking some pictures of the Canyon, we headed to Petra. I really didn’t know much about it, but Alan has seen some pictures of it and was really looking forward to taking lots of pictures. We walked the Siq about 500 yards and you come the first building carved out of the rock…I can’t tell you how breath taking it was to see The Treasury…
After Petra, we headed to Wadi Rum, another amazing surprise. Wadi Rum is a national park made from sandstone and granite rock in South Jordan. The home to many Bedouin tribes, they even had camps that you go to for the night. What I loved about Wadi Rum, were the camel crossing everywhere, so in the US we see lots of deer crossing signs but here it camels! We even saw some wild camels running around – so crazy.
We randomly came across one of the Bedouin campgrounds and decided to spend the night. We took a hike to watch the sunset, then came back to an amazing dinner and chatted with the owner about Google search rank…he was just stating to market on the internet. The next morning we asked him for a jumping shot before we headed back to Egypt to spend some time in Dahab.
Check out more pictures for Jordan, Petra and Wadi Rum.
