Aqaba and the Wadi Rum

Monday, March 30, 2015
Petra, Petra, Jordan
On arrival in Aqaba we went out for dinner and had a traditional meal that has a type of flatbread covering it (instead of pastry). The main non alcoholic drinks here are fruit juices, like lemon or lemon and mint. Refreshing but quite sweet. After dinner we had a little walk through the market. One of the big differences between here and Egypt is that here the vendors are much, much less pushy. I guess that's because the standard of living in Jordan is much higher, plus it's less than a tenth of the population of Egypt so less competition for the tourist buck.
After that we all crashed . We had the next morning free so we wandered around the market in the morning. Love the spices and tea's. Have bought a few. Am hoping there will be no issue getting them through customs.
We left Aqaba at 12 for our night in the desert at Wadi Rum. The road we were on is the desert highway but some parts are what is known as Kings Way, which is the ancient trading/ caravan route. We stopped at a train station which has an old train and apparently there will eventually be a tour here that follows in the footsteps of Lawrence of Arabia. We drove into the Wadi to a Bedouin camp, had lunch, then clambered into the back of utes for our trip in the desert.
It's a stunning landscape. As with most deserts this is believed to have been ocean millions of years ago. It's a beautiful landscape. The Nth Americans on the trip say it's similar to their southwest. The huge rocky outcrops are beautiful. We climbed a few. Of course the lads had to go clambering all over the place. There was a little bit of hooning by our driver who was a very good looking young lad . We stopped and had some Bedouin tea which is very nice. It's essentially a type of chai I suppose. It is lightly spiced with cinnamon, hibiscus and a few other things. We watched the sunset in the desert while drinking Bedouin tea. Beautiful. After that we headed off to our camp. We had dinner which was really good. Lamb and chicken that had been cooked under ground for four hours. The meat was falling off the bone, and the chicken was good - I thought it might be dry.
The boys got a campfire going. It is really quite cold at night. We toasted marshmallows which is not a very Jordanian thing to do I guess! Sat around for a while but I headed off to bed in our tent. I haven't been sleeping great. Wake up too early and on the go all day, so I get pretty knackered. The bed wasn't great. The pillow was rock hard but I dozed on and off. I woke first and went for a walk. The sun was rising so I could hear lots of birds. The area is quite green at the moment, very pretty. After breakfast we began the drive to Petra! Indie is getting excited!
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