Aqaba - Wadi Rum -Jordan

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Day 15 - Saturday 17th October. Ferry crossing to Aqaba in Jordan.
We departed Dahab at 8.30am and after 2 hours arrived at the port village of Nuweiba for our ferry crossing to Jordan. Tracy our tour leader just explained that every time she does this crossing the procedure is different. There is an exit tax of 50LE plus the ferry ticket of 60LE both are paid at the ferry ticket office where our passports are needed before a ticket is issued. Next we go through security where we must all present at least one bag to be x-rayed. It doesn’t matter if we leave our main luggage on board just so long as we have 1 bag to pass through the security screen, Go figure! After security it’s a trip to the emigration office for a passport stamp and we are told to move to the departure area, a few minutes later we are allowed to walk back out to the truck which is on the other side of emigration. Now it is just a wait and see situation with today’s scheduled ferry departure at 2pm but it may be 4pm or even later. I will report back from the other side.

Running true to Egyptian time we departed at 4pm for the 3 hour ferry crossing. We have been treated as special passengers. First up we walked onto the ferry, it is a large ex Danish ship similar to the Bass Straight ferries that we have in Tasmania. After boarding we were taken to the “Café Kitchen” an area that is air conditioned and set aside for tourists. The “Locals” were divided up into 2 classes. One group allowed access to inside seating and a restaurant area and another group that were given the outside deck areas to use. One noticeable difference to the Tasmanian ferries is that there are no smoking signs all over the place in English and Arabic that the crew conveniently ignores.
Our truck was loaded on last so that we will be one the first able to disembark. We arrived in Jordan around 7pm and were met by a local contact. The customs and immigration is being handled by Tracy and our local contact as a “group entry.

By 8.30pm we had our entry Visas and were officially in Jordan and on Jordan time. A quick stop at the duty free shop and a short time later we were at our campsite, again sleeping under the stars.

Wadi Rum

Our first mission today was a short visit to Aqaba town centre. Aqaba is a special zone in southern Jordan the whole of the zone is duty free and is Jordan’s only access to the sea. Just across the bay is Israel and Elat. Israel is a “no go” area for everyone on the tour. If anyone has an Israel Visa stamp in their passport they will be denied entry into Syria.
A few of us found where the locals were having breakfast and watched Falafel being made, we ordered tea and coffee and the waiter brought a complimentary dish of fresh cooked Falafel, They were so nice that we bought 3 bags at ½ JD or roughly 70 cents each. After a supermarket stop for drinks and snacks we were off to Wadi Rum. T.E Laurence is spoken of highly by the Bedouin people as he is attributed for having united the various people in what became know as the “Arab Revolt” which resulted in the Turkish forces being driven from Arabia during the First World War. Aqaba was the most notable success as the Turks had their heavy guns facing the sea and were not expecting an attack from the land side. Wadi Rum was where Lawrence and the forces he commanded passed through. We had an afternoon in Wadi Rum on the back of 4WD jeeps. This is an impressive area with some amazing cliffs and rock formations. It reminded me of the Colorado Plateau in Utah. In the late afternoon we left the Wadi Rum reserve and drove off the highway to camp out in the desert. We will be seeing lots more stars tonight.

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Photos

Fresh Falafel
Luke and Lily

Comments

[Paul John Barrow]

I've learnt more from your blogs than i ever did during school history lessons! I really should have paid more attention. Dead Sea next?

[SanAntonio Howard]

Good Work
Keep it up - especially the cheeky pics. Howard

[davidt]

Thanks Paul. yes you should have paid attention to your history lessons, and probably your maths, science, english and geography lessons as well. Were there attractive girls in your class that distracted you or some other problem? Sean diplomatically asked me to give the"Reader's Digest" version of Laurence of Arabia while we were sitting outside his (supposedly) house ruin in Wadi Rum. I got a round of applause for that. Of course I could have (did?) made up some stuff and no one would have been the wiser. See you in 2 weeks. 14th November. I have your Single malt :-)