Petra and Wadi Rum

Jordan happened quickly. Our plane landed at 8 am, we rented a car, and headed to Petra. I had not thought about renting a car, and of course car rental is complicated by my lack of a credit card, but there is very little infrastructure in terms of the transportation in Jordan, and the direct bus from Amman to Petra goes just once a day.

I told my mom that we were renting a car, “PROMISE me not to pick up any hitchhikers!” she implored, I hadn’t really thought about it, but I promised. Sure enough, there were tons of hitchhikers on the long desert road from Amman to Jordan, probably because of that same lack of public transportation. I passed them all by, thinking of Peg.

We had arranged to stay for two days in an AirBnB that was a cave, An actual Bedoin cave, hosted by a cheery young guy named Saif. “My grandfather gave me this cave,” he told me. Nestled in a limestone rock formation the color of sunset, the cave has a door and a lock and a single light bulb dangling from the ceiling, powered by a car battery. Very warm and cozy.

Our car has a portable WiFi! I used it to send a WhatsApp to Saif; everything had gone so smoothly at the airport that we’d arrived ahead of schedule. The portable WiFi let me open the geocaching app; one Jordanian geocache, 0.45 miles away! So we started off hiking through a canyon of limestone and caves, some with carvings and paintings from the 1st and 2nd centuries.

There was a little Bedoin shop at the top; we had tea with the owner and walked away with some souvenirs. After we hiked down, we caught up with Saif. He showed us our cave and drove us down narrow, winding mountain roads to some desert sand dunes, to see the spectacular mountains and watch the sunset over Wadi Aqaba. We saw Bedoin tents and many camels along the way.

Coming home to our cave, Saif’s mother had prepared dinner for us. We hung out for a little while with some people in the cave across the way. Two tourist women from the Netherlands, and a young woman from Massachusetts who came to Jordan three months ago and fell in love with Ayman, a young Bedoin. She has been living here in his cave with him ever since. They offered me a sheesha to smoke; a hookah with apple-flavored tobacco. I took a few puffs, for the flavor and to be social. It really bothered Declan, even though I told him it was not a drug that would make me high. “I’m going to tell Grandma,” he muttered, darkly.

An excellent night of sleep in our comfy cave, and we are off to tour Petra. I am embarrassed to admit that I didn’t realize how huge Petra was. I have seen the beautiful photographs of the Treasury, that iconic structure carved in pink sandstone, but I didn’t realize that so many remains of the city of Petra have survived, to explore. To make the day a bit easier, we entered on the back side. Usually people walk through the whole city of Petra and then climb up 800 steps to the monastery. Saif had his friend drop us off at the beginning of the hike to the monastery so that we could walk down those 800 stairs instead of up.

The Nabateans are the ancient race of people who have been living in Petra since 3000 BC; many of the structures of the city of Petra are from the 1st century BC to the 2nd century AD. The monastery, the theater, the temple, the court, the royal tombs, the prison cells are all in the center of town. But the people’s caves where they lived are scattered about, on the outskirts of the main town. And there are still Bedoins living in many of these ancient caves. You can tell because there is a modern door and a modern lock on some of the caves.

As you walk through the ancient city of Petra, there are many little souvenir stands, selling Bedoin knives, bits of colorful sandstone, traditional scarves and hand-embroidered dresses, perfumes. But the vendors are not insistent; it is nice to have tea with a beautiful view, and the Jordanian flag flies everywhere. Sugary tea, Bedoin coffee, apple-flavored sheesha smoke bubbling through elaborate hookahs.

I really loved Petra, more than ancient Egypt. It seemed more laid-back, less overwhelming. Not as many layers to unpack; there are many Egyptologists, but maybe not so many Jordan-ologists. The human scale of the city was evident; the life of the city took place in the center, and the people lived in caves on the outskirts. It seemed more relatable, somehow, but Petra came a couple of thousand of years after the Pyramids!

It was nice to walk with Saif. He took us around the back way, and we had a chance to explore some caves and some natural rock formations with hardly anyone else around. We hiked up to a place where we could see the Treasury from above. It was late in the day and starting to get cool, so I reached in the backpack for my jacket. No jacket.

My head reeled. The key to the rental car was in the jacket. Where could I have lost it? I rewound the afternoon in my mind. I had taken the jacket out several hours ago to get toilet paper for Declan; I hung the jacket on the back of the chair while I waited. Was that the last time I’d seen it? I didn’t know if I could hike back up, all that way, before dark.

“I will go,” Said promised. “But first, let me talk to some people.” I was trying to figure out Plan B: the key is lost, I will have to call Avis in Amman (3 hours away) or Aqaba (2 hours away) and see if they can bring a spare key, and we will miss our reservation for the Jeep tour of Wadi Rum…It was sounding expensive, and I had no credit card, and I worried that the next few days would be hijacked by this mistake.

“He has the coat!” shouted Saif. “He will send it down with a boy and we will meet him at the Treasury in 20 minutes!”

My eyes filled with tears. What have I done to deserve such luck? I felt like someone has sprinkled pixie dust on my life.

We meet the boy and I give him all my cash as a tip, just $7, and walk out through the Siq. The Siq is a gorgeous, narrow canyon of rock that leads from the Treasury to the entrance and the visitor center. Saif pointed out some sculpture on the rock, of kings and camels.

Another night in the cave (the AirBnB listing says: Bathrooms: 0), and we are off to Wadi Rum in the morning. We stop at a little Arab place for a “breakfast sandwich” of hummous and falafel; Declan was in heaven!

We arrived at Wadi Rum just after 10, and we were supposed to be at the office at 10 o’clock. “Throw your things in the truck!” the young Bedoin man yelled.

We jumped in a 4 x 4 pickup truck and started on our desert tour, stopping to see various sites along the way: a canyon with ancient writing, a giant sand dune that you could “sand-board” down, some natural bridges made by rock formations, the “house” of Lawrence of Arabia.

But the main highlight was Wadi Rum itself: endless walls of massive sandstone formations, layers of red and brown and black, rising up out of the desert for as far as the eye can see. Declan loved riding on top of the truck, and he convinced me to climb up there with him. The views were just spectacular. We did a bit of hiking, through a canyon, some rock climbing, and then we spent the night at the “Bedoin Lifestyle Camp”, which had a hot shower, a nice dinner with music and sheesha afterward.

Strange to be just 15 km from the Saudi border; on the second day, Akram our guide drove us to the mountains that form the border with Saudi Arabia. On the second night, we slept out underneath the stars. Atallah, the manager, had told me we would be sleeping in a cave, but actually, it was just a little cove of a sheltered area; we slept in the open desert, looking up at the stars, enjoying a bonfire and a sheesha. Declan, once again, did not approve of me indulging in a sheesha. He told me he worried I would get addicted, or get lung cancer, but I think it was just a question (as always!) of power and control. It was so great to sleep under the stars; so alone, so many stars, looking up at the moon. Akram, our guide, told us about being an extra in the movie “All the Money in the World”; I look forward to checking it out!

We saw a lot of Greek tourists, because there are apparently some new flights of just 50 euros from Athens to Aqaba. And we saw some American and New Zealand tourists who were living in Berlin; their flight was just 50 euros from Poland. Jordan would be such a great one week trip!

There are 11 million or so people who live in Jordan, including two millions Syrian refugees. When we went out on the desert jeep tour with Akram and got close to the border of Saudi Arabia, we met up with a family who tended the sheep. They were Syrian refugees. It seem like they were happy to have a job, but it is not possible for the children to go to school in this remote desert location.

I thought the Bedoin people were all warm and lovely and great; I really loved Jordan. It was interesting to hear Ziv (my Israeli friend)’s take on Bedoins…more on that in the next chapter…Israel!

Black men: immigrants from Sudan