Blogs from Jordan, Middle East - page 108

Well the following day was a border crossing day, as in it took until 5pm for the 3pm ferry to get going, then getting through customs the other side was another hour. We stopped in Aqaba in Jordan, and immediately we could see the difference between Jordan and Turkey. The money was clean, like the city, and the people didn't hassle you. It was great! Our drive to Wadi Rum (the desert where Lawrence of Arabia shot to fame), where we were sleeping for the night. The drive took us up from the border crossing town and we could see 4 countries all at once. Obviously, we were in one, Jordan, but we could also see Elat in Israel, back across to Egypt and also across to Saudi Arabia. The camp we stayed at was ... read more

We had quite an interesting day following Petra. We head north and stopped first at the ruins of an old Crusader castle called Shobak, built high up on a hilltop, one of several in the Jordanian countryside. The road leading up to it was very steep, single lane with a sheer drop 1 foot off the edge of the road. Amazing views from the top though, of course! The knights used these views to effect, as it's positioned in one of the three main routes running north-south through Jordan, and it allowed them to see anyone moving through the corridor and thus control trade routes. The castle was once captured by Saladin after a 2 year siege. Following some more twisty turny narrow mountainside roads, we proceeded to a little village on the edge of a ... read more

...andthefinestmerchandisethissideoftheriverJordanonsaletodaycomeondown!!hehe! Well, actually it was Aqaba, not Aggribah, but I'm such a fan of Aladdin I couldn't pass up that opportunity. (Hi Ian!) Sooo, lets try for a shorter post today, I'm falling too far behind. After our exploits on Mt Sinai we continued to the Egyptian coast to board a hydrofoil for the '1 hour' crossing to Jordan. Well, that was accurate, it did take about 1 hour to cross. What they didn't mention is the 4 hours sitting on extremely uncomfortable wooden benches inside customs with absolutely nothing to do, the ~1 hour it took to travel 200m and get on the boat (involving loading on to and off of buses), the ridiculous amounts of arguing and gesticulation between officials, or the 45minutes we sat on the stationary boat at the other end ... read more

As a sportswriter for Al Ghad - Jordan’s leading Arabic daily - Akram’s managed to remind me what a complete powder puff I am in the world of serious journalism. Working six days a week, chained to his desk deep into the night as I’m eyeing the girls in Abdoun, he’s a source of both boundless admiration and abject pity. There are about four hundred degrees of separation, I suspect, between me and legitimate press credentials; but as I chat up a young teacher in the Broadway café - a half-Columbian, half-Swiss beauty with eyelashes that can practically hail a taxi - I admit there’s something to be said for my own half-assed brand of softball journalism. When we decide to take a day-trip to Umm Qais - an old Roman city just a few ... read more

Yesterday I spent seven hours on a camel; re-enacting the march of El Lawrence (Peter O'Toole or Ralph Fiennes, I'm not picky :P) across the desert of Wadi Rum in Jordan before taking a lovely Bedouin-ette for my wife (pictures will follow - when I get around to uploading!). I learnt a few important lessons during the march that I think will prove useful for future El Lawrences: 1) Calling 'For Aqaba' at the top of your lungs while sitting atop a camel can be detrimental to your heath; it should not be attempted, no matter how good it looks on film. 2) Too many El Lawrences can spoil even a desert march - so make sure yours doesn't include more than one adament, arabic-learning, Lawrence lover - and defintely not three. (Note: I am not ... read more