Advertisement
Entrance To Petra
All to myself. Lovely After leaving Lebanon the same way I came in, within 1 hour of my Lebanese visa running out I was back in Syria, $52 poorer, just for a Syrian transit visa. It has cost me more to get in and out of here then it has being in Syria and Lebanon. Oh well.
I didn't fancy a last look around Damascus, so I stayed at the bus station waiting for my 3:00pm bus to Amman in Jordan.
Another one of those bus rides that could have been over a lot quicker, with some extra long waits at the borders and a hour long stop at a duty free shop. Yep, I really need a set of saucepans and a plasma TV, any room on the coach? Bollocks!
We arrived in Amman at 10:00pm, I walked down towards the downtown area, my chosen rest stop here was the Ferah hotel. It took a little while to walk to, but I was not going to let a taxi driver win.
Hotel seems nice, clean and hot water, nice. I walk around the centre, seems OK, loads of food shops. Not much chance for a beer here so I grab
Petra Treasury
The whole thing some food and go back to the hotel
Next morning I walk up to the bus station to catch a bus to the Roman city of Jerash. One hour north of Amman, and with some top Roman ruins, apparently. I arrive at Jerash (I think). It's another one of those middle eastern bus stations in the middle of nowhere. The taxi drivers don't want to take me to the town and rob me of my money, no one wants to help. So I say "Bollocks" and look for the next bus back to Amman, this isn't easy either. No one knows apart from the kebab shop owner, he offered me a lift in his ute. Doug Willis would be proud of me as I accepted. "Come on Pam".
We got about halfway and broke down. Balls, wheres Henry Ramsay when you need him?! I got another lift off a minibus which didn't exist at Jerash to the outskirts of Amman. Then a local bus to the centre. Local buses are fun. The driver never stops, he just coasts when people want to get on or off. I get thrown off near the bus station and walk into town,
Pesky Locals
"Let's get in the way of everyones photos!" back to the hotel to sort out my next trip, along the kings highway to Petra. Due to me being the only one interested in doing this the next day, it would cost me 65 English pounds, ouch! Hopefully some others will go too, but the hotel is nearly empty, it looks unlikely.
The hotels TV has Back to the future on, in English, with Arabic subtitles. I wonder what the Arabic for "1.21 Gigawatt's!" is? I go to a internet cafe to listen to the England match against Northern Ireland, I should not have bothered, England lost 1-0, they never seemed to score anyway. I chatted to the cafe owner for a bit afterwards. Just because I said I worked on computers back home, he wanted me to go into partnership with him shipping PC's from England to Jordan. We will see how desperate it gets for money soon!
With no one else wanting to do the Kings highway tour, I decide to just get a but to Petra for 2 English pounds. Now I am going through real desert, no rocks just fine orange sand. There are road signs here telling drivers look out for camels.
Petra Monastery
Well worth the walk. If you can avoid the donkey shit. I know I am in the middle of nowhere now!
Wadi Musa's/Petra's bus station was pretty central, and not too far from my hotel here, The Petra Gate Hotel. It was not near the gate for Petra though, thats about 2Km's down the road. It's cheap and the beds are comfy so I can't moan too much. I walked down to the Petra entrance, but it's really too late in the day for that so I go get some food and go back to the hotel. I ask the manager to flick through the channels on his satellite TV to see if the first day of the 5th test is on. No chance. Never mind, will have to listen to the net for a while.
I was up at 5am in the morning to visit Petra, before the heat and hopefully before the hordes of tourists arrive. It was quite chilly on the way down to the entrance. Petra is a expensive place to visit, 20 pounds. I pretended to be a student and only pay 11, which is still a lot of money. Some more walking until the real start of Petra a narrow winding canyon, to
the main attraction, the Treasury. This is the building that is on a million postcards here in Jordan. And I have it all to myself, great.
It's called the rose red city, more orange I think, plenty of tombs and excavations still going on. Plenty of donkey shit and flies too. Instead of getting a donkey taxi to the monastery on top of the whole site. I decided to save myself 2 pounds and walk, and spend a hour going up the stairs. It was well worth it. Bigger than the Treasury and better in my opinion. I had some great views over the "rose red" city and surrounding desert. I got another bottle of water from a shop which is strategically put here and walked back down. There is a museum here too, but it's not very good. It's only plus side were the gents toilet rolls, as there is none elsewhere in the Middle East. Most toilets here are squatters and you clean yourself with a hose afterwards, The Petra museum toilet storeroom had loads of it, so my 11 pound included a roll, a fair deal I think. You leave the same way as you come
in, getting a chance to see everything from a different angle. I left the site at 1:00pm. That's 6 or so hours. This is one of those must see world sites, and it lived up to expectation, superb.
Instead of walking up to the main town I cheat and get a cab. The driver was teaching me some Arabic on the way up. To be honest I completely forgot when I paid and closed the passenger door. Time for a siesta, something I have yet to see a Middle Eastern person do. They work in the hottest weather imaginable and all hours too, take note Spain.
In the evening I had a listen to the rain affected cricket and some dinner. I had to be up early again the next morning for my bus trip to Aqaba and on to Egypt.
A early bus to Aqaba. The only city in Jordan with a coastline and a crossing to Egypt. I arrived at the bus station looking for a taxi to the port. A cabbie told me the ferry was sold out, "You will have to go through Israel to get to Egypt". There is a lot of
Thirsty?
I don't know what the 5th drink was, I will let you find out.. difficulty if you visit a Islamic county with a Israeli stamp in your passport. I was avoiding it for that reason, but then I thought "Fuck it" and get another stamp in my passport. Even if the taxi driver was only after a bit of extra cash. It will be my 26th country I have visited, one for every year of my life.
Bye Bye Eastern world for a bit and Shalom to the west again!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.071s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 7; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0427s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb