A drive through the Kingdom

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Today, as always, we started out with a delicious breakfast of pancakes, omelets, and toast. We then started out for a long day driving to Amman, the capital city of The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. The drive was supposed to take 5 hours, and believe me, 5 hours is a long time when all there is to see is desert. We learned first hand that Jordan is mostly flat desert. However, there were several high points.

For one, we were able to see an old Crusader castle, built to help defend Jerusalem from the Muslims in the east. It was well preserved, and we saw the moat, barracks, bakery, dining room, kitchen, stables, and larger living quarters. We also went through a museum about the Crusaders and the region in general, that was situated in one of the rooms of the castle. As we were driving away from it, we were able to see a tunnel that Saladin dug to try to get into the castle.

For another, we went up on Mount Nebo, where Moses supposedly saw the Promised Land. The story goes that Moses, after wandering around the desert for 40 years with his people, climbed Mount Nebo at age 120. There, he saw the Promised Land of Palestine/Israel. Of course, this is all highly unlikely, seeing as the record age so far is like 116. However, is was pretty cool to see the ruins of the church that was there, and some mosaics that they constructed.

We continued on to Amman, and toured the city a little bit, looking at uptown and downtown, as well as the Roman theater and the King’s office. After that, we headed out to the airport, and boarded our flight for Cairo.

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