remember khaleel, our taxi friend from jerash? he agreed to take us on a day trip to aqaba and wadi rum. best decision i’ve made in jordan thus far. he (conveniently) brought along his police officer younger brother, which is handy when you are a bit of a traffic outlaw. i don’t think there was single police officer we did not stop to say hi to. even if the police officers were on the other side of the highway, khaleel and his brother would literally get out of the car, cross the highway, and chat up the police officers. I remember once during the evening, khaleel was speeding away back towards amman, and among of the many things we sped past were a cluster of police officers. about 100 m past these police officers, khaleel puts the brakes on the taxi and backs up right up next to them. and then, once again, the greetings and small talk. he even got their number this time. at the conclusion of the trip, he did not once get ticketed for speeding. the brother was certainly a good choice.
aqaba:
coastal city situated right next to the red sea. beautiful place. normally the place is packed on thursdays and fridays. we left amman at 6 am & arrived at aqaba around 9 am. stayed there around 3-4ish…upon our arrival, we took a paddle boat out into the red sea. it was a great time on the water. we were able to look out across the water towards egypt in on direction & palestine in another. apparently, jordan’s king hussein has an aqaba home that i had pointed out to me as well. The water was so clear, absolutely pristine. so peaceful out there. at the conclusion of our paddle boat ride, we decided to grab onto the side of a glass boat and in this way, we were pulled back to shore, without any effort at all on our part. after paddle boating, we had relaxed on the beach drinking coffee and water. lunch was afterwards at bukhara restaurant, which is located right next to al-sharif al-hussein bin ali mosque. food was so good – chicken, rice, some kind of salsa thing, salad, yogurt. mcdonald’s ice cream along the beach then skipping rocks with little jordanian boys. briefly walked through the courtyard of the aqaba archaeological museum, which is just outside the historic aqaba court, walked past the tremendous flag pole with the flag of the arab revolt mounted on it (apparently it’s the 5th tallest freestanding flagpole in the world @ 130 m & can be seen from israel, egypt, & saudi arabia). after airing out the car, cranking up the air-con, spraying half a bottle of lady’s perfume into the a/c vents, himself, and the rest of the passengers in the vehicle (i.e. us), khaleel set the car into motion & we were off to wadi rum!!
wadi rum:
wadi means “valley” in arabic. this is a valley in southern jordan made up of granite & sandstone mountains. there are some really cool rock formations here & the blend of reds, oranges, browns are really something. khaleel said that everything time he comes to wadi rum, it’s different because the element are constantly and ever-persistently altering its landscape. we stopped at a resort/camp meant for tourists that i believe was nearby an actual bedouin camp. we climbed some of the outcroppings behind the camp & found ourselves looking out a marvelous view of the valley & surrounding desert. afterwards, we went on a jeep tour that took us until the valley. our first stop was at a sand dune. we went on the tour nearing sunset, so by this time, the surface of desert’s orange sand had cooled off, but once you started to dig your feet into the earth, you could feel the different layers of heat hidden beneath the veneer of the sand. the sand was so soft. climbing & then sitting atop the sand dunes was one of the best things in the world. i felt so at peace & so happy. it was such a surreal experience to be so far away from civilization, from the life i’m used to. i felt so once with the earth. it was a bit of a spiritual experience. it was so much fun running through the sand, making sand angels, & being buried alive by khaleel & his brother. soon we were back on the jeep, riding through the valley with our hair billowing in the wind (would’ve made for a great pantene commercial). not long after, we stopped at a cave that our bedouin tour guide claimed once served as the house of lawrence of arabia. it was a fairly small place. there was some red dirt outside the cave that we used to decorate our faces for war. after the cave, we stopped at a bedouin pit stop tent. the tent was made out of goat wool, which is amazing at keeping out the heat in the summer & cold in the winter. the place was very cozy & we sat there for a bit, relaxing on couches & sipping cinnamon & cardamom tea that had been boiled over a fire pit in the middle of the tent. chatted up an old man bedouin & told how much I loved the place and he said in the future i should live with the bedouins… for free! next stop was at “the mushroom,” a rock formation that looked like a mushroom. we climbed atop the thing. when you were standing, you could hear the roar of the wind rush past you – nature’s many melodies – but if you laid down, the wind swept right past you & didn’t reach your ear drums at all. it was so quiet. last stop served as an opportunity for us to watch the sunset (in arabic, “sunset” literally means: the westing of the sun). back at the camp, we climbed aboard our taxi carriage & drove a little ways away from the camp then stopped to climb on one of the outcroppings to wait for the stars to make their appearance. so many stars! tons of satellites. even saw a shooting star. could always see the milky way extremely clearly. last time i remember seeing the milky way so distinctly was in mexico during 2008. we made it home around midnight. The whole trip (taxi ride, lunch, paddle boat, snacks, souvenirs, jeep tour) was 60 JD (~$85). not bad.
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