Sleeping Under the Stars…

This morning was an incredibly laid back morning. We didn’t have to be in Wadi Rum till 4 and we didn’t have to be out of our hotel till noon. Habits are hard to break though and we were both up by 7 AM. We got some breakfast-and lunch . At breakfast we met Kelly, who had just gotten to Petra last night from Amman and was going to see the city today. We had gotten 2-day passes yesterday and, since we were exhausted from the hiking yesterday, gave her our extra passes. After breakfast we rested in the room, watching the American economy crisis and being thankful to have a few days to wait to re-enter into that situation.

Oh My… Petra…

Jac’line and I made sure we were well rested today because we both knew there would be a lot of walking at Petra. Apparently, Jac’line had forgotten just how much walking there is because we were both VERY surprised by how far we had to walk to get to some of the ruins.

We were eating breakfast by 7 AM. It was a huge buffet and we both filled up, taking doggie bags for later in the day. Since Petra was walking distance from our hotel, we were walking through the tiny siq-tunnel-into the ancient city by 8 AM.

Heading South… For HOURS…

We got up early this morning to get our rental car and get the heck out of Amman.

By 8:15 Dave and I were standing outside Reliable Rent-A-Car in downtown Amman while Jac’line filled out the paperwork for the car. This gave Dave and I an opportunity to get acquainted. He is from Toronto and is a salesman for a telecommunications company. He flew into Amman and is going to be going to Turkey by next week to see some friends. He’s a really nice guy and reminded of one of my cousins in New York.

When we had the car, I navigated us out of the city and onto the main highway heading south out of Amman. Mind you, I have no GPS maps for Jordan. So we are going old-school here with paper maps and expanded maps of cities. It’s frustrating following the road on a map when you can know EXACTLY where you are with a GPS. Needless to say, I’m planning on getting lost a few times as we both get more comfortable driving n Jordan.

Coming To Terms With Amman…

After finishing the post last night at 5 PM, I took a nap. I woke from the nap at 6:30… AM!!!! I must have been exhausted because Jac’line said I slept like a rock. I was pretty refreshed but who wouldn’t be after 13.5 hours of sleep? It was shaping up to be a good day of rest. Ironically, it’s also Shabbat in Israel today.

We had some coffee in our room and went down to the lobby for breakfast. Breakfast is the wrong word to describe the meal we were served. It consisted of a single hard-boiled egg, two slices of pita and cheese. :-/ They skimp a bit on breakfasts here in Jordan.

Over The Border (And It’s Shady)…

Before going to be last night, we decided that we’d push our day back an hour tomorrow to get some additional rest. We left En Harod at 8:15 and took a cab to the border. Our cab driver told us that Jordanians really don’t like Americans and that we should be careful. He suggested we tell people that we are from Scandinavia. At the time, he put a bit of fear in us that probably affected our first impressions of Jordan.

At the border we had an interesting time getting through because frankly, we just didn’t know what to do. We followed a large tourist group and got all the stuff we needed to board a transport bus over the Jordan river and into the checkpoint on the other side that would admit us to Jordan.