Hanging in the Balance: December 2010

Wadi Rum part 2

Another bedouin tent and tea

One of the bedouins put this Hata on me.

A well

A camel drinking bowl

Two trees

Well today we are still in Jordan after a great day at Petra yesterday. We stayed at a unique hotel called Taybet Zaman which was a little village like structure of individual villas, restaurant, Turkish bath, craft store etc. It was all made out of stone, inside and out so it felt like you were living in a compound of luxurious caves ...kind of like Petra. Jeff said he felt like he was in the Flinstones house. A different experience. We all forgot bathing suits so we could not enjoy the Turkish baths.Today our Agenda includes a jeep tour through the desert at a place called Wadi Rum, lunch and sightseeing in Aquaba, a beach resort , like Eilat, then back to the border to enter Israel.We then take a flight from Eilat to Tel Aviv. I am writing this on the 50 minute airplane flight. Jordan has been an experience, but I am looking forward to getting back to Israel. There is such s stark contrast once you cross that border ...Israel is beautiful, and sparkles in comparison. Again, like I said in previous blogs I have a sense of peace and tranquility in Israel I have not had in any other country I have visited. In Jordan, I felt the complete opposite, a little tense and uneasy.Not afraid, just out of my comfort zone. There wasn't the hospitality there is in Israel.Our driver picked us up early and we went to Wadi Rum, an area in the desert where Lawrence of Arabia was filmed and he actually lived as well .We got into a jeep and went driving on the desert sand stopping for tea courtesy of Bedouin hospitality( the desert wanderers) and got to see some unusual rock formations and some other areas of interest in this vast desert.Some pictures below....

It's a vast desert.....

Mushroom rock behind us

Cool rock...I look around and all I see is sand and mountains( rock mountains)

Bedouin serving us tea in his tent

The home of the real Lawrence of Arabia- but the movie was filmed in this part of the desert

Outside his cave

Can you make out the camel carving in this rock? Thought to have been done in about 100-300B.C.

A dog
More Pictures part 2

Petra part 2

- a taxi

Another ruin thought to be a commercial building of some type

Caves. The people lived in these caves

Family shot....in the backround lots of caves where people lived. Size of cave one had depended on how big the family was. These were all hand made by just digging and carving with primitive tools

More caves

On the bottom is a carved out aqueduct. This is how they got water to the village from cisterns and sent throughout the village ( like primitive pipes) Apparently , try had some way of filtration as well

Another set of caves. At last count there were 17,000 caves in Petra

Going back...the roundtrip walking was over 14km ,we also hiked up to some of those caves

Petra,Jordan

Well today we left Israel and crossed into Jordan. The crossing involved lots of lines and passport controls, customs after which you have to physically walk over the border with your luggage and a Jodrdanian driver meets you on the other side.It was cold and rainy...yuk..but our destination of Petra is supposed to be one of the wonders of the world, not to be missed,if at all possible . And now after seeing this unbelievable place, it is a must see for anybody visiting in this area of the world. Petra a is a small village about 2 hours from the Jordan/Israel border. It's a wonder of ruins dating back to about 100 B.C.E.They were amazing to look at and in this case pictures will do more than words. According to our guide Suliman, it was a town of commerce and trade,including spices, amber for perfumes and Mir also for perfumes , but also found throughout the bible. Let's get to some pictures...

The entrance to Petra , this was formed by an earthquake

Mir( red) gold stones are amber used for perfume and insence. Mir is used for perfumes and is referenced in the bible for other purposes( sacrifices )

Guard

Carved by the Napathians( early settlers of Petra) to look like an elephant

They prayed in these niches in the stone. They are everywhere.

Narrow passages

Chariots, mules, horses and camels took those who didn't want to walk it. It was a good 10 miles with lots of steep climbing at times.I

This magnificent ruin is so well preserved. This is how it was found,no renovation has been done. It is called the treasury as there was thought to be treasure here,
but none was ever found and they now believe it was a temple

More pictures part 2

Pictures of Eilat

Not much to take pictures of compared to the rest of the trip, basically lots of huge hotels, shopping, beach, restaurants and cafe's...an upscale beach resort