On the Road in Jordan and Sicily

 

Paris at night, in the rain.

Well. We’ve been on the road, and things have been happening too fast to keep up, let alone write about! But let’s try to recap.

 

Our trip started about two months ago… well, the calendar says three weeks. It just feels like months. We went to Paris. Thanks to train strikes, though, we had to cancel our first three train reservations. Finally, we flew, arriving a day late to meet our friends, Sue and Alan from Oregon. Again, due to strikes, the sidewalks were stacked high with garbage bags. And, it rained. But we managed to have a good time anyway (hey, it’s still Paris!) 

Then we flew to Ammon, Jordan, and things really started happening. We didn’t get to explore Ammon itself, because we kept going elsewhere. Specifically, the incredibly extensive Roman ruins at Joresh, and Mount Nebu, from which Moses saw the Promised Land (which he was not allowed to enter because of his moment of doubt). Legend puts his grave on the mountain, although no one is quite sure where, exactly. We were thrilled, though, to look down on the Dead Sea, and the fertile valleys surrounding it. This is biblical territory. Lot and his salty wife. John the Baptist. Noah (the guy with the ark). The aforementioned Moses, and his brother Aaron. Amazing!

The ancient Roman city of Joresh. Rows of columns!

Paula and I surrounded by tall columns, the remains of a temple to... some Roman deity!

View from Mt. Nebu; that's the Dead Sea on the left.

But before we really could grasp the full significance of all that, we were off to Petra, an ancient city carved out of cliffs. Made famous socially (sadly! as it was already famously historical) by an Indiana Jones movie where Indy rode past the incredible façade known as the Treasury. We spent the day winding our way through the siq, the narrow slot between fantastically high and fantastically colored cliffs. We returned to our hotel tired and sore, only to do even more the next day.

 

The temple called the Treasury, carved into the rock face at Petra.

Our second day of hiking at Petra took us through this landscape...

...to get to this, called the Monastery; also carved into the rock.

After that our trusty driver, Hamdan, took us the two hours to Wadi Rum, a protected desert area, where we spent a couple of nights.

 

The desert at Wadi Rum. Quiet... and orange!

The desert is quiet. Very very quiet. And orange. And quite intense in its tranquility. (Well, at least until the water truck came by and spent a half-hour pumping water!)

 

One feels very small out here!

After that it was a four-hour drive (Hamdan again!) through the Jordanian desert to the north shore of the Dead Sea, where we spent a couple of nights in a high-rise luxury condominium resort. That was pretty much empty, except for us. (It was the start of Ramadan, a month-long period where the Islamic faithful refrain from eating and drinking—and smoking—during daylight hours… so things were a bit slow!)

 

Sue and I, not dead but floating on the Dead Sea.

Then we were back in Hamdan’s car at one in the morning to get to the airport for a 4AM flight. After a couple of stops (Athens, Rome) we landed in Palermo, Sicily for the next phase of our trip.

  

So, that’s the overview. There is a lot alota detail to fill in, but tomorrow morning we’re off to the Roman mosaics at the Villa Romana del Casale, somewhere in the middle of Sicily. We have many, many tales to tell. But we’ll catch up eventually!

  

Overview of the Roman ruins at Joresh. Did I say they were extensive?