Petra and Aqaba

This is just a warning, you may danger yourself with the amount of jealousy that will ensue: I went to the place where Indiana Jones found the Holy Grail. Bam! Ok, are you still breathing? I think everything is going to be ok...

That's right folks Petra, the site of the ancient Nebatean city carved right into the Jordanian mountains- complete with tombs, treasury, monastery, and of course camels (pronounced in Arabic something like "jamaal," or as we like to say "jamel"). Today it is one of Jordan's largest tourism pulls and a place for a lot of Bedouin business. We drove for hours through the desert after classes and ended up in the city of Wadi Mujib on Thursday night. We had dinner at lovely little place that served gamiya, which is a Bedouin stew type of stuff that was delicious! We also wend swimming in the hotel pool which felt like a bath tub, mmmm! We heard of this place close to our hotel that is supposed to be the oldest bar in the world- naturally we had to go! Cave Bar, was, as the name implies, a bar in a cave- which was really a carved out building, but cool none-the-less. I had Mt. Nebo wine, made from the famous site in Jordan.

The next morning we headed out to the ruins bright and early, a blessing in disguise as we were heading out by the time the sun was killer and the narrow way filled with tourists and donkeys. The way into the mountains is through a narrow pass that makes for a gorgeous hike! Once you get into the ruins site it is just filled with buildings and columns and dust and Bedouins selling goods. My group hiked up to the top- a crazy hike! We went up to the Monastery and also over to a look-out spot called "The End of the World" and we were so high it literally looked like the world just ended off in the distance. No wonder folks used to think the world was flat! I loved the morning hiking around and I got to see some amazing things. I also stopped off and bought some souvenirs from the Bedouins, some jewelry made through the Queen Noor foundation established to help increase revenue for the Bedouin women and also increase Jordanian crafts.

After Petra our group jumped back into the dusty hot tour bus and drove out to Aqaba- a resort town at the coast of the Red Sea. It was beautiful! We stayed at a 5-star hotel right on the beach and spent the whole afternoon going back and forth between the pools and the beach. It was wonderful! Some friends and I went out to have dinner and I ate fish from this fun little balcony filled with fountains. The next day we tried to go snorkeling- I've heard the Red Sea has some of the best, but the waves were too choppy so we went back to our beach. It was so nice! The water was clear and the water was a bit saltier than normal so it was easy to float around. I could definitely go back there! The weekend was the perfect mix of physical activity and adventure mixed with relaxing laziness!