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Petra and Wadi Rum, Jordan
Tuesday, Apr 07, 1998

Indiana Jones and T.E. Lawrence

David Murray
2007-02-02 02:34:59

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We left early the next day as we had a date with Petra. Now my earliest memories of Petra, in fact my only memories of Petra were from the movie, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Remember, spell Jehovah right and you can get further in !!!!!. First stop was downtown Aqabah as we had to load up on beers as we did not know when we would be able to load up again as the country is dry. Now the other thing I failed to mention was that if Iraq ever needed to find a body double for Saddam Hussein, they could look no further than Jordan. Every man here seems to look like him , right down to the moustache !!!!! Off we drove, and you begin to feel slightly sane as the Jordanians do not use the horn, but their driving was still slightly scary. We made our way to a hotel above the site and settled down for the night. Classy hotel, it actually had a sit down toilet, but the door wouldn’t shut properly, because of the toilet !!!!! Next morning, up bright and early, to hit Petra. We caught a taxi to the site, and then, as we are tourists, it was on horseback for 800 metres. Then walked. Now just like the movie, there we were, going through the cliff, and then it appears, the Treasury. Amazing. This was the most impressive thing I had seen up to this point in my life. After checking it out, we then went further into the site, burial sites everywhere, and then up a mountain to the high alter of sacrifice, and down the other side, where the Romans had cut an amphitheatre into the bare rock !!!!! Through another passage, and the there it was, the most impressive site in Jordan. The Monastery. This was huge. So we climbed up the side and stood on top, mooned all of our fellow passengers and then came down. It was superb. Time to leave, we ran into the Jordanian guide who told us to follow him through a creek bed. He explained that they had flash floods here during spring, and 20 metres above our heads, were trees strewn everywhere. This was amazing. A much better way out, one that tourists very rarely use unless you are with the right people. Once back, you do as everyone else does. You watch Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Once again, it was an early start as we had to get to Wadi Rum to run around like Lawrence of Arabia. But getting people’s A into G, was a worry and as we did not make it there, we had to camp in the desert. Cracker, being the trainee driver, decided to guide us off the road. 70 metres in, we were bogged. Nice one Cracker. So we cooked dinner and settled down for the night. Then the Police arrived, and as we were Westerners with a few blonde women, they decided to stay and guard us for the night. Morning came, and we drove off to Wadi Rum. Did the jeep experience, a huge let down, one that I refused to pay for, which the tourist police agreed with me, but being the fool that Cracker was, he paid for us !!!! Needless to say, my wallet did not open up to give him the money back. Next port of call was Syria, but first we had to have a dunk in the Dead Sea, this we were looking forward to. We walked out, and then we bobbed up and down like a cork float. It was weird. After fifteen minutes, we came out and it felt like we were covered in brine !!!!! We then moved towards Syria, where once again Glenn did state that this will be a dry country and you will not be able to buy alcohol here.