Letail Petra

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Having finally (kind of) settled back in to the States I'm gritting my teeth and buckling down to finish up the last third of my Mid=East trip. In my Constitutional Law class...but anywhoo

As we breezed our way through the Jordanian border one thing I did stop to do was ask the tourism office how much a cab from the border to Aqaba would cost. 5 dinars. For both of us? 5 dinars. Total? 5 dinars. For two people? 5 dinars. Well with that settled we walked onto Jordanian soil, and asked a couple of cab drivers to take us to the bus station.

That's when we found out that the last bus to Petra had left hours ago. And while normally cab drivers would just lie about that so they can convince you to let them drive you for wildly inflated prices, I realized that when I was researching this trip - extensively - I had made a mental note that we would have to cross the border early at Eilat to make the last bus. We would arrive in the town next to Petra mid-afternoon then just bum around Wadi Musa because the last bus was really early in the afternoon. Instead, when executing this extensively researched trip, I suggested we sunbathe in Eilat for a few hours with this niggling suspicion that we needed to be crossing the border but since I couldn't for the life of me remember WHY that might have be important I ignored it.

Fine, so if the bus has already left, we would just go to Aqaba and spend the night there, would one of the taxi drivers take us to the bus station in Aqaba? Well first we had to field the offers to drive us to Petra - at least a two-hour drive - for 70 DINAR (!!) then 60, (still no)..."but there aren't any cheap hostels in Aqaba..unless you want to sleep in my apartment" - no thanks. How about just taking us to Aqaba? 10 dinar(!!), but I asked inside the border and they said 5. Well it's not 5 for two people, it's five for each was the response. But I asked that ALSO and they specifically said 5 dinar for two. Nope, 10 total. At this point I was tired, and annoyed and the drivers were being assholes and I was just like FINE, 10. Take us to Aqaba. I guess the other option was walk down to the highway and try to catch a taxi but like I said, we were tired.

So we get in the taxi and I whip out my guidebook because I need to find us somewhere to sleep tonight and the driver is going on and on about how there is no where cheap to stay in Aqaba (false), I tell him I've got six listed in my guidebook I'm willing to try, that the bus takes 6 hours from Aqaba to Petra (false) that one I tell him is an out and out lie, it DOES NOT take six hours to get from Aqaba to Petra, it's maybe three. Then the spiel stars, why don't we take a taxi to Petra, for 60 dinar, I say it's because we can only afford 15 each, (since we are paying 5 each to go 5 miles, may as well pay 10 more to go all the way there and not have to pay for a useless hotel in Aqaba and the bus in the morning), OH but it COSTS 32 Dinar in GAS JUST TO GET THERE! Ok, well I can't afford anything more. What about 50? no. 30. What about 45? No. 30. What about 40? Ok? 40? Still no, still can't afford it. I'm like 35, that's it, we can either drive to Petra for 35 dinar or drive to Aqaba for 10 but that's it.

The driver is like 35?! And PULLS THE CAR OVER to the side of the highway, and Aliza and I are both thinking that we've somehow so offended him with this low offer that he's just going to kick us out of the car on the shoulder halfway to Aqaba when another cab pulls up in front of ours and we are told that this new cab will drive us to Petra. For 35? yes. Total? Yes. 35 for both? Yes.

Sweet, I win this round. We hop in the new taxi and finally we are actually on our way to Petra, we hang out in the taxi for a bit, taking pictures and marveling at the scenery. The mountains that you could see in the distance in Eilat are now up close, in fact the one in front of us juts directly out of the earth in front of the road and it looks like if we drive much further we will literally run straight into it. Instead the road curves, through fantastic red desert mountains, we pull out our cameras and because we are Zimmermans, our books, and alternate between reading and snapping pictures. Aliza falls asleep and I continue reading and occasionally raising my head to gawk at the fantastic views, mountains up close! In the distance! Flat plains! Rolling plains! It's a really long trip, but it's late afternoon so the lighting is just perfect.

The one little issue that I've had on this whole adventure though, is that we are driving through featureless desert, on a road that has no identifying markings, and no clue where we are going or even the correct general direction. After about two hours we reach a road-block where the road has been closed, our driver tells me that there has been an accident and instead of a half an hour away we are now an hour away. Our detour takes us up a mountain and then, right as the sun sets over the desert and sets the sky on fire, before fading into soft purple, if you were looking from above you would see we are still trundling across a vast plain with nothing that looks like a massive ancient city of ruins anywhere in sight.

So at this point I'm pretttty sure that we've been sold into white (or brown as the case may be) slavery. And I don't want to mention anything to my sister, because what's the point? And all I can think about is how mad my mom will be when she finds out I got us (potentially) killed. Things are not looking good...and I'm sitting there literally planning my attack for when the car stops. Also on the ground, the car doesn't feel like it's "trundling" we are actually hurdling across the plain, on a one lane road, with enough gentle hills to not really be able to see if anyone is coming.

An hour or so after our detour began we FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY make it to our destination right as the last light fades over the horizon over Petra and the lights turn on in Wadi Musa. I've literally never been happier to pay someone 35 dinars to let me get out of their cab at the door of the Valentine Inn, the hostel I've chosen fairly arbitrarily for us. It got mixed reviews online and my guidebook actually took a paragraph to explain that it DOES NOT endorse the Valentine Inn.

We book ourselves for two nights - because we can't count - at 5 dinars a night - at the same time as Ian, a Canadian who just finished up birthright and has extended his trip to do some traveling before heading home. We got settled, drank some free(!) tea and spent some time in the common area, meeting some Peace Corps volunteers stationed in Kyrgystan. That evening I hung out at the hostel, chatting with three Germans and this HILARIOUS englishman who explain to me that the Europeans on holiday are in a secret towel war - everyone wants to get their seat by the pool for the next day by placing their towel on the chair to claim it. Apparently the Germans are winning, because the English are sneaking down at 2 am, chuckling about how clever they are, only to find that all the chairs are already covered and the Germans have beat them once again.

Further we find out that a) the price for tickets to Petra rose on New Years day 😞 and also that it apparently includes a 12 dinar horse ride. Required. You HAVE to buy this horse ride. And it's the sort of thing (or so I'm told) where you enter the gate and you follow your group and they are all heading for the horses so you get on a horse and a person leads you, walking your horse, maybe a kilometer (tops) to the top of the Siq. And then they ask you for a tip. For the ride that you didn't want, that you were forced to buy. Here's a tip "don't talk to strangers"!

After the hostel couldn't get the VCR to work - trying to play Indiana Jones of course - I went to bed fairly early, because we were going to make the 7 am bus to Petra and milk that expensive two-day ticket for all that it was worth.

Somehow we managed to sleep through the call to prayer at 5 in the morning Tuesday morning (Jan fifth), but still wake up around 6:30, enough time to pack our day bags, for me to realize that I somehow forgot to pack a change of pants or an extra shirt, or a towel, and chow down on a granola bar before the free shuttle came to take us the mile or so down to the entrance to Petra. We bought our two-day tickets at the ticket office, including our 12 dinar horse ride, and then walked down through the gate and into the park.

To the left of the gate is a horse stables type-thing I believe it is also a veterinary clinic as well, but there was nothing really happening there because it was so early. We began our walk down the hill, aliza, myself and our Canadian friend Ian. We stopped at one tomb - I believe the tomb of the Obelisks, clambered up to look around the upstairs portion, took pictures, and kept going, taking a few stops to take pictures at various tombs - mainly just holes carved into the rocks (boulders) that line the road which is descending towards the Siq, and is pretty wide.

After about a kilometer down the road you reach the entrance to the Siq, which is where the real fun begins. Before now you've been taking pictures of every tomb and carving in the rocks that you've seen because HOW COOL, little did you know how much more impressive it got, and how on your way back out past the same tombs you literally wouldn't even look twice at them.

But here class is over, and so I will have to pick up from the entrance to the Siq next time I'm in class 😊.

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Photos

In the taxi on the way to Petra
Before we thought we had been kidnapped

still in the taxi
Still not nervous about our potential demise

STILL NOT AT PETRA
3 hours in, and starting to get desperate

We made it!
This is what the first Kilometer from the gate to the entrance to the Siq looks like

on the way to the Siq
Small tombs in the hillside

Tomb of the Obelisks
We thought this was just the COOLEST