Jordan

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J:

Jordan is an island of stability in an otherwise fairly hostile part of the world. It is bordered by Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the Palestinian occupied West Bank, yet we found Jordan to be a friendly and open country, and we soon lost count of the number of locals saying 'Welcome to Jordan!'

We arrived in Amman and spent our first day visiting the famous sights. The most celebrated of all, the Roman Theatre is an amphitheatre built on the side of a valley in Jesus' time. It was closed when we went but we could see the whole grand structure from outside anyway. Next we made our way up to the Citadel but with the light fading and Holly's broken toe aching we turned around before we got there. We had heard about a street of cool cafés and bars called Rainbow Street but between our dodgy hand drawn map and our limited directional skills we never found that either.

We may not have been hugely successful at finding the sights of Amman but we certainly found an excellent restaurant called Jafra. We gorged on lamb kebabs, hummus, chicken fattah, Arabic salad and more and needed a rest before we could get up and walk home.

Walking around the city Holly remarked that she was often the only female on fairly busy streets. Once she'd pointed it out to me I couldn't help noticing what a sausagefest Amman was. I'm not sure where all of the women were but all the shop owners, restaurant workers, drivers and passer-bys were men.

After Amman we made out way south to the other end of the country to Aqaba. Aqaba is Jordan's holiday town. We stayed in a small resort about 12km from Aqaba town which was beachside, had a pool and restaurant and even a minor diving operation - basically everything we needed for a couple of days so we never actually ended up going into the town. I went on a couple of dives in the Red Sea only metres from the shoreline. The water was as clear and still as glass and we drifted past a sunken military tank and through soft coral in pursuit of sealife.

Next we headed to Jordan's national treasure, Petra. We approached Petra along the Siq – a narrow passageway only a few metres wide which wound through 50 metre high solid rock cliffs. Apparently this passageway was created when tectonic plates pulled the rockbed apart, and we were walking though the resulting crack in the earth. The Siq continued for over a kilometre then the path opened up and the 2,500 year old city carved into solid mountains surrounded us.

The first façade we faced was the most famous Petra sight of Al-Kazhneh ('Treasury' in Arabic). Beautifully and intricately cut into hard red rock, it was very imposing. We climbed flights of stairs and admired the view from the High Place of Sacrifice then proceeded along past royal tombs in different stages of erosion to the Grand Temple which lay partly in ruins.

Next we walked and climbed several kilometres up to the mightily impressive Al-Deir (Monastery). The sheer size was breathtaking. Al-Kazhneh had been very heavily restored whilst on the other side of the scale several other smaller tombs have been eroded into almost nothing. Somewhere in between these extremes, Al-Deir was full of character and was my personal highlight of Petra.

Petra is undoubtedly a wonder of the world, and it ranked alongside the Taj Mahal, Ankgor Wat, Mt Everest and Great Barrier Reef as the most spectacular sights of our trip. In short it was a magnificent way to end our travels.

We spent seven months in 12 countries immersing ourselves in the most amazing worlds but the adventure had come to an end. We travelled by buses, boats, cars, tuk tuks,bikes, trains, planes, elephants and camels. We went to metropolises, villages, islands, jungles, deserts, under oceans and to the highest mountains on earth. We stayed in hundreds of hostels, hotels, guesthouses, homestays and teahouses. We spent nights on boats floating the ocean and in the deserts under nothing but stars. We met up with dozens of our best friends and made many more but now we must finally return home.

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