Hello everyone,
Monday night’s Petra by night “show” was alright, but they could do so much more with it. We walked once again to the Treasury and there were candles all over the ground which was pretty. But the Treasury wasn’t lit up properly until right at the end. Some musical instruments were played in between but the man explaining them was very hard to understand. Also, people suck. I should know this by now! Some people talked and took flash photos virtually the entire way through, one woman even answered her phone. I really don’t know why I’m still surprised by stuff like this. You can’t go to the movies this days without some moron taking out their phone.
But aside from that, the lights were pretty and I lay back and looked at the stars above the Treasury. Once I blocked out the murmuring voices, it was great.
In the morning we set off at 9am (sleep in!) for Little Petra. Little by name and little by nature, it’s a very mini version of greater Petra. It was still interesting though and worth a quick look. Little Petra hosted many traders and as a result we saw many water storage facilities the Nabateans had created and lots of rooms with benches and fire pits. Apparently it was also where camel caravans would resupply themselves. In the 4th and 5th centuries, little Petra became a farm used by both the Nabateans and the Romans. We had a giggle because a stray dog came and plonked itself next to Hakam while he was guiding us through.
At the back of the complex there was a sign (like the many we saw yesterday) saying if we followed the pathway we would see the “best view in the world”. The sign was very wrong, the view was nice but certainly not the best. But the scramble up to the view was fun and reminded me of the Cathedral Ranges at home.
At this point, our poor guide Hakam had to leave us and head back to Amman. His wife had a baby the day before our tour started, and the baby is very very sick. He said he would still come to Wadi Rum but we all told him we wanted him to be with his family as that was more important.
So for the rest of the day we were guideless. But we were fine because we had scheduled activities all day Hakam had organised, and our driver knew where to go.
We got to Wadi Rum, Jordan’s biggest Wadi (valley). It takes up an area of 716 square kilometres and its name means ‘valley of sand’. The landscape here is so dramatic and incredible! Lawrence of Arabia famously made his way through here during the Arab revolution a few times, it was a big base for the Hashemite army.
We set off on a four hour ‘jeep’ tour. I’m surprised G Adventures approved this tour because we were in the back of utes with no seatbelts, open top, going over bumps. At one point our driver was texting while driving too which I wasn’t very impressed by. It was fun, but I’ve done a few desert safaris with G and this was by far the least safe. It was very dusty so I wrapped my scarf around my mouth and hung on tight haha.
We saw the specific part of Wadi Rum where ‘The Martian’ was filmed (it’s the photo of people standing taking photos in the Ute) and then some carvings from thousands of years ago. These depicted some animals that are no longer here like hyenas and ostriches, but also ones like camels that we still see in Jordan today.
We saw some interesting rock formations and a well including an archway. Then we came and watched the sunset. The landscape was beautiful, but the sunset itself was so so. It was nice, but I’ve seen better. The landscape itself though was amazing. I can see why it was chosen as 'Mars' for the movie.
The itinerary said we were camping at a Bedouin camp, but in my opinion it was “glamping”. After camping in Africa for a month last year with hardly any facilities, it was a welcome surprise arriving to find tented ‘rooms’ with beds in them, clean and bright toilets and a fire pit. We had a yummy dinner and got by with the basic English of the people running the camp. Then our new guide, Nadal, arrived. He said he’s done many tours but that due to the emergency nature of which a new guide was needed, this is his first G Adventures tour.
The stars outside were beautiful - like diamonds! We sat out looking at them and talking to our new guide before heading to bed. Overall, the beds were pretty comfortable considering it was 2 degrees outside. It was another time that I was glad to have my sleeping bag and beanie, because both kept me toasty warm.
We are now having breakfast at a different camp and are off to Aqaba today.
Love to all
Claire
Xoxox
PS: We just found out that Hakam's baby boy passed away. How absolutely awful :(
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