Jordan

After a brief stint back in the US so that we could both work in SF for week, have an engagement party, visit some friends (in San Francisco, San Diego, and Chicago), and reset a bit, we set off for Jordan.

Sinead's good friend from UCSB, Faris, is from Jordan so we have been wanting to visit for years. It's never that convenient to travel to the Middle East because of flight paths and location, but we decided now was the time! Jordan is known to be one of the safest countries in the Middle East and since we had our personal local tour guide, we weren't concerned about our safety.

Me, Sinead, and Faris

Wadi Rum

Immediately after our plane landed in Jordan, Faris picked us up and drove us 3 hours south, straight to the desert. A group of his friends were having an all night party in Wadi Rum and his cousin was DJing from 2-5am. Wadi Rum is a giant red sand desert (where The Martian was filmed) with really cool rock formations.

We stayed at a bedouin camp where bedouins (semi-nomadic Arabs whose ancestors have roamed these deserts for thousands of years) prepared food and tea for us in the semi-permanent tents. It was a really awesome setup with great food.

Inside the main bedouin tent

Inside the sleeping tent (where no one actually slept)

We stayed up all night dancing and chatting with Faris's friends (who all spoke fluent English) and then watched the sunrise over the rocks. It was an extremely tiring but extremely awesome start to our trip.

The party aftermath

Since we were in the desert, we couldn't pass on the opportunity to take our first camel ride...

Fun fact: The pattern of the scarf on the bedouin's head is specific to Jordan - each region has their own

Aqaba

Next we drove down to Aqaba, a town on the very tip of the Red Sea, with Faris and his friend (and now ours) Dania. We relaxed at a beach club and recovered from the previous night before Faris and Dania returned to Amman to work.

Sinead and I stayed in Aqaba because you can SCUBA dive in the Red Sea from there. Who knew there was awesome diving in Jordan?? (Answer: Sinead did.) The visibility was incredible and we were able to fit in several perfect-condition dives, including a huge shipwreck. I had never been inside a wreck before, so it was a cool milestone for me.

Aqaba is located right where Jordan, Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia meet. We could see all 4 countries from our hotel at once.

Egypt and Israel across the water, Saudi Arabia to our left

Our hotel also had sweet floor tiles and a great roof to pretend we were Aladdin running through the rooftops on an Arabian Night.

"I can show you the world..."

Petra

Each day, we did something new and exciting. Petra is the reason most people visit Jordan. It is an ancient city dating as far back as 500 BC. The history is not precise but it was apparently a trade hub between Asia and Rome and within the Middle East between Syria, Egypt, and Arabia. It was an area where the Nabateans learned to harness the water, despite being in the desert, so they were able to thrive. With all the money they had from trade, they decided to create elaborate facades in the sandstone. Enough of a history lesson.



We took a cab up to Petra and enjoyed the sights along the way. We had had such a good time at the bedouin camp in Wadi Rum that we decided to stay in another one in Petra. It was another really cute experience (except when the water cut out and we couldn't shower...we were never clean on this trip).

After enjoying tea by the campfire, we went to Petra by Night. They light up the walk through Petra to the Treasury (the most famous and detailed facade carved into the rocks) with candles. There they have thousands of candles illuminating tomb. People played traditional instruments and sang as we drank tea and absorbed it all. At the end, they lit up the Treasury with a some colorful lights (so pictures finally worked).

It was our first glimpse of Petra and it was pretty incredible. The facades are surprisingly intact and I had a hard time accepting that they hadn't been restored or altered from their original appearance. It is just so crazy that they could withstand the conditions and all this time.

The next morning, we went to Petra in the daylight. There were a fair amount of tourists, but not as many as I expected. We heard that only half as many people come here compared to before the Arab Spring.

We hiked though the ancient city and even took a donkey ride up to the Monastery (another detailed facade). The pictures say more than I can describe.

The Siq, a colorful mile long canyon leading the way to the Treasury

As with all of our adventures, puppies arrived to make things even better

Tombs for days

Riding donkeys is surprisingly fun

The Monastery 

Sinead had a lot of fun taking camel selfies.

At the end of the trail, there was a very kidnapper-esque sign that promised the "Best view in Jordan." It ended up actually leading us to an incredible view with an even more incredible experience. We came upon a bedouin man who lived in the caves of Petra. He had a little rest stop and we sat and sipped tea with him overlooking Wadi Musa, the desert that divides Jordan and Israel. Sinead and him enjoyed exchanging their thoughts on history and politics, and we both learned a bit more about bedouin law.

Caves where a few of the bedouins live

Amman/Dead Sea

We eventually arrived in Amman where we stayed with Faris in his family's house. His parents were the sweetest and most hospitable.

The setup for his parent's fancy-pants dinner party

Faris is obsessed with animals and took in a stray kitten from the streets. His mom was not so into it.

Faris (and Dania) guided us on a hike up a canyon near the Dead Sea. Hiking is not big in Jordan despite the beautiful landscapes. So the first half mile of the hike was filled with trash and graffiti from the gypsies who inhabit the area. Once we got through the trash though, the canyon was gorgeous and we had it all to ourselves. The sun lit up the rocks above with hues of bright reds and oranges while the stream below cooled us off.

We found crabs in the creek which seemed really odd to me. These bio nerds loved it.

We drove through the Jordan Valley (where Jesus was baptized and a lot of the Bible stories took place) to the Dead Sea. At 1,400 feet below sea level, it's the lowest land on earth. And the water is 10x saltier than the ocean. We hopped in the water where the salt content is so high that we floated high on the surface without inflatables. It was insane. It felt so strange.

Me, Dania, Faris, and Sinead

This video captures the buoyancy pretty well:

I love a good bath, and this was the ultimate bath. It was the perfect temperature (I'm guessing it was 92ºF), I could stay afloat effortlessly without the hard bath bottom, and I had an incredible view. I stayed in the water for hours and could have stayed in for hours longer.





We covered ourselves in the mud rich with minerals and chilled at the pool above the sea. The mud is is supposed to have health benefits and healing properties.





Faris and Dania showed us the posh sides of Amman including the new mall, fancy rooftop bars, and the Amman Design Week exhibit.

Amman Design Week

The "new downtown" could have been Bay Street in Emeryville...or any outdoor American mall

When we were on our own, Sinead and I explored the downtown area where the people weren't as affluent.

We went in search of the best shawarma and falafel and they were both truly better than what you find in the US. Shawarma sandwiches are basically Middle Eastern burritos, so Sinead was particularly in love with them.

In Jordan, the weekend is Friday and Saturday rather than Saturday and Sunday. So Thursday is when everyone parties. And they party hard. Hence, on our final night, we went to a "lesbian friendly" bar and then a gay bar. Despite Jordan being a Muslim country, there was a substantial underground gay community that came out at night. They are closeted during the day and to their families and can face harsh backlash, but I was surprised at how much of a community there was.

After a fun and busy week, we left Jordan, but decided to continue our travels through other parts of the Middle East.