Jordan - 2017 (Part 3)

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Read Part 2 of this report

Wednesday PM - Wadi Rum

The next couple of hours were spent snoozing or watching the desert pass on the bus, including a considerable distant on the bumpy and rather dull Desert Highway, which follows the path of the old Turkish built railway for many miles, which was plagued by T.E. Lawrence and the Arab tribesmen in WW1.

Eventually we pulled off the road and were greeted by 5 white 4WDs. They were more comfortable than the pickups we’d been in at Petra, but didn’t possess Range Rover like luxury.

We headed off in convoy into the Wadi Rum desert and stopped to look at a train which, sometimes, takes tourists to be kidnapped and whisked into the desert by tribesmen (only to be returned after a hearty meal and a night under the stars), which was of the same type as the Turks used (and Lawrence of Arabia attacked) in WW1.

'Indy' (actually Bosco, a GP from Australia!) and I couldn't resist play acting!

After that, we drove on a little way and stopped in front of an impressive outcrops of rock, now known as the “Seven Pillars of Wisdom Rocks” after Lawrence used a picture of them on the cover of his memoirs of that name.

After photos here, we headed, at some speed across the desert, sometimes sliding across and down dunes. We stopped for very refreshing tea at ‘Lawrence’s House’.

Of course he didn’t live in a house, but it’s in the film, the building was probably originally Nabatean, the same people who built and lived at Petra.

We also stopped at and (unwisely) climbed a huge sand dune (on foot!), which was exhausting as the sand gave way beneath us and made progress up it nearly impossible. Those of us who reached the top were pretty pleased with ourselves, but after my climb at Petra that morning, it felt like incredibly hard work! Coming down was incredibly easy!

We also visited the Stone Bridge (not really a bridge, but an impressive rock structure), which some climbed. I started to, but then realised how high and narrow it was, not good for someone with a fear of heights, so I admired the top from halfway up and then carefully made my way down again!

After that we headed to our camp for the night. On arrival we all headed to some rocks above the camp and watched the sun set over Wadi Rum.

We stayed in small tents overnight, eating a traditionally cooked meal of chicken (cooked in a hole in the ground, but very tasty!) and listening and (some) dancing to traditional music.

When the musicians finished, some went to bed, whilst others chatted or just, like me, relaxed and looked up at the desert sky. I marvelled that I could clearly see the Milky Way, something I’d never seen before.

It sounds a bit cliched, but at the time it was pretty special, believe me, and like so much else of the tour, it was just enough time and different enough from Petra and Jerash and the Dead Sea to make the whole trip seem perfectly balanced and varied.

Thursday - Wadi Rum, Karak, Wadi Mujib & Dead Sea

One thing On The Go Tours don’t do is misrepresent themselves in the name and it was another pre-7 rising on Thursday. After a quick wash and breakfast, we took different 4WDs directly back to the main road and rejoined our bus.

We noticed signs saying it was just 40KM to Aqaba, but a good chunk of Thursday was spent on the Desert Highway, heading back north to the Dead Sea.

The one slight disappointment of the trip occurred today. We stopped at a cafe/shop on the Highway for over half an hour. It had been a long time (a couple of hours) in the bus, so we all welcomed a break, some had a coffee or tea and stretched our legs, but most were bored here within 15 minutes as the shop was a typical tourist trap with high priced items.

This wouldn’t really have mattered except that our next stop was the impressive crusader castle of Karak. We arrived here and spent, at most, 20 minutes, which really wasn’t anything like enough time to explore it. We’d become used to a bit of a whistlestop tour of sites followed by half an hour to explore for ourselves, so it was a surprise and, yes, a disappointment, to be hustled back to the bus after this whistlestop tour.

The castle looked great, set on heights dominating the town and we could easily have spent an hour or two exploring it, so this was the one black spot on the tour, but really only because we didn’t have anything like enough time to explore.

Grabbing a tasty chicken ‘sandwich’ from a local shop, we continued on towards the Dead Sea.

We arrived on the northern edge and headed down past the area of the sea where Jordan’s industrial plants extract salt and other elements from the lake.

About halfway down most of us (but not all, some skipped this strenuous part), left the bus to spend an hour or two canyoning in Wadi Mujib.

There’s a dam above the Wadi, which guarantees a flow of water, even in the summer and this is partly used to provide a tourist attraction.

We set off into the Wadi, very much like the Siq leading to Petra, walking through a gently flowing stream, but pretty quickly it become strong and deep enough to be a struggle to walk through and, indeed, ropes are positioned along the way to help you work your way through particularly strong currents and up and over the numerous waterfalls.

The trip notes described this as a ‘moderate-paced hike’, but in reality it was a pretty strenuous canyoning trek, which only the reasonably fit and agile should probably undertake.

After one particularly steep and tricky waterfall climb, Mandy, Nadia and Lorraine decided that was far enough and the remaining few of us continued a little further to a vertical waterfall where we slid down into a plunge pool beneath (I had a couple of goes, surprisingly no-one else did, even the younger members of our party!) and then made our way back to the others (a couple of hundred yards further back).

Some of the tricky climbs going in were water slides coming out, so it was easier and most of us used our lifejackets to drift along in the current, although most of had a few bruises the next day from smacking into submerged rocks!

Again, it was something very different and, for me, certainly a good part of the trip, it was nice to be cool and wet for a couple of hours, for a start!

After that we headed back to the hotel, which turned out to be a lavish resort on the Dead Sea. After arriving and unpacking (Our room was large and comfortable, but had a ‘view’ of an internal roof and nothing else, but the balcony was handy for drying things), I wandered down past the 4 pools and numerous bars to the beach, where I bumped into Josh and Bosco (both heading off the following morning, people seemed to come and ago through the tour as different groups from different tours overlapped) coming back from a quick float on the Dead Sea (“Yes”, they said, “it is as floaty as people say, and very, very salty!”).

As we had a whole day here the following day, I decided to wait, but most of the tour group met for drinks and then had dinner together, which was indicative of how well we’d got on as a group generally.

Friday - Dead Sea

After such a busy week, Friday was somewhere between a blessed relief and an anti-climax. All we did was sit on the beach or cool off in our room.

We experienced the extremely floaty Dead Sea and, yes, you really do float effortlessly on the surface (although it was a bit choppy this day, so it wasn't conducive to reading a book while you floated!)

We did take advantage of the free bowls of Dead Sea mud and were all surprised to find that our skin really did feel softer after putting it on. Presumably the elements in the Dead Sea really do have some benefits (I was told in Aqaba of an Austrian woman who came there to treat Eczema that had almost completely cleared up after 4 trips).

In the evening, most of the remaining group had dinner together again and chatted over the trip. A number of people were heading onto Israel for a few days, whilst we were heading down to Aqaba. Poor Lorraine felt a bit dejected as she and Scot, Debbie, were heading home early the next morning, but everyone agreed, the trip had been excellent.

Saturday - Dead Sea to Aqaba

We were down a little earlier than our allotted pick up time to see most of the rest of the group off on their way to Israel, with hugs and handshakes all round.

At 8:45, our driver turned up in a smart executive Hyundai and we set off for Aqaba. We’d expected to rejoin the ugly Desert Highway, but he took the Dead Sea Highway, which, unsurprisingly, follows the shore of the Dead Sea and was a much more attractive route.

We made good time, with our friendly driver noting places of interest along the way and we arrived at Tala Bay, to the south of Aqaba town (almost on the Saudi border and with both Israel and Egypt visible across the Gulf of Aqaba) before noon.

Again, the Movenpick Tala Bay was a luxurious resort location, with plenty to do onsite, if you wanted to, including numerous pools, bars, restaurants and, most importantly for me, a dive centre.

I wandered down and introduced myself and got a dive on Kiwi Reef, which lies directly off the hotel’s shore that afternoon.

You can read about my diving here, if you’re interested

That evening we took the free shuttle bus into Aqaba and had a meal, but it was clear that Aqaba isn’t really geared up for mass tourism, clearly the majority of people staying in the area were in similar resort hotels to ours.

We didn’t stay long and headed back to the hotel a couple of hours after arriving and relaxed in our room, which was comfortable, roomy and luxurious and offered a view across gardens to the pool and, in the distance, the sea.

We both agreed that this was the nicest hotel of the trip, but such holidays aren’t really what we enjoy, so, Mandy especially, got a bit bored.

Sunday - Tuesday - Aqaba

On the Sunday and Monday, I had a couple of dives and Mandy headed into Aqaba one day only to have an incident where someone tried to steal her backpack. This was unusual as generally we’d both felt very safe around Jordan and, to be fair, when she ducked into a bank to avoid this guy who was following her, the security man quickly chased him off, so we’ll chalk this one down to an exception, although it did shake her confidence to walk around alone a little.

We walked down the beach to the nearby Tala Bay complex for dinner one evening and enjoyed watching the sun go down across the Gulf of Aqaba and the hills of Sinai across the water.

On the Tuesday, we had a last dip in the pool early (after the usually excellent buffet breakfast) and packed, ready to check out at noon. However, we weren’t being picked up until 11PM with a flight from Amman the following day at 6:40AM!

We travelled back into Amman, hoping to visit the castle, but it’s been closed for some time for renovation, so we could only walk around the outside, wander down to the huge flag pole on the sea front and then spend an hour or so wandering around the town, which doesn’t really reward the time spent, if I’m honest.

Back at the hotel, the dive centre people let us use their showers and changing room and we chatted with them for a while, before spending another hour sitting by one of the pools as the sun went down.

We then ate an excellent Pizza in the hotel’s Italian restaurant and then watched a bit of Belly Dancing in one of the bars, before waiting for our taxi in reception. About 10:45, I said I’d wander down to the entrance in case the driver was early and as I did I met our driver from the Dead Sea walking towards us, he was driving us back to Amman too! It turned out he lives in Amman, so at least he didn’t have to drive all the way back to Aqaba too!

We slept some of the way up the Desert Highway, but still felt pretty shattered at the airport. Our check in was reasonably quick and passport control and security trouble free. The flights went OK, although we found the wait at Istanbul pretty dull, as did our car pick up and we got home about 6PM on Wednesday!

Summary

We had a great time in Jordan.

Petra lived up to (even exceeded) our high expectations, but Jerash, Wadi Rum and other places were very impressive in their own rights and the balance of the sites and activities on the trip were excellent.

The guided tour was good too. There was a good mix of ages, but we all got on pretty well, even to the point of eating together when we didn't need to in the evenings.

As often's the case, we wouldn't rush back, there are too many other places to visit and we felt our tour at least introduced us to the main sites and sights, but we'd definitely recommend Jordan as a place to visit to anyone!

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