Jordan
We had two surprisingly good years in Jordan between Sep 2007 and Sep 2009. Surprising not least because of the hospitable people, great food and the many fascinating places to visit. A few of them are gathered on these pages.
First impressions
22 Aug 2007Welcome to Jordan! We arrived in this land of contrasts at the end of August 2007. Some people told us it was boring and quiet, yet others told us it was dangerous – how could it not be, nestled between Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Israel and the Palestinian Territories. Despite these contradictory warnings, in our first week we only found positives – the people were friendly and welcoming, the weather was great, the food was delicious, apparently crime was almost…
Home sweet home
22 Oct 2007Just like our apartment in Bangkok, I thought you may be interested in our home in Amman which we shared with various cats. We had a really great time here between August 2007 and August 2009 We found a home fairly quickly after arriving. It was just what we were after, it was quite large, the ground floor flat of a three storey building, had a garden and was a five minute walk to work. However, it didn’t have an…
Snow!
23 Jan 2008Think of Jordan and you generally think of desert. And you’d be right 90% of the time. However, in January 2008 we had a couple of days of quite heavy snow. Locals said they hadn’t seen it like this for over 20 years and everything came to a complete standstill. If you are from colder climes you may think the following pictures are nothing special, except perhaps for photos of palm trees covered in snow, but for Jordanians it was…
Birds of Jordan
22 Mar 2008Jordan is a great place for birdwatching especially in Spring and Autumn when many migrants are passing through on their way to and from Africa and Europe. Along the King’s highway is a great spot for bird watching – especially in spring. We saw a number of migrants on their way to Europe for the summer. Another good spot is the Azraq wetlands reserve. Although it is no longer that wet, it does have the only drinking water available for hundreds of miles. And…
Oases & desert castles
22 Apr 2008Jordan’s deserts comprise 80% of the land area but only 5% of the population. the biggest desert starts as the suburbs of Amman peter out and continue East to the Iraqi, Syrian and Saudi borders. The area is mainly desolate as you’d expect but there are a few highlights, both natural and man-made. One of these is Azraq oasis which used to provide water for roaming herds of animals. Unfortunately since the 1960’s it has had to supply water to…
The King’s highway
The King’s Highway is the name given to the modern incarnation of the ancient route which travels almost the entire length of Jordan from Amman in the north to Petra in the south. Giants throughout history have trodden its path from Moses through the great Roman Emperors to Richard the Lionheart. Not surprisingly it is therefore the site of many historical monuments and also not just a few natural ones including Jordan’s ‘Grand Canyon’. The ancient crusader castle of Karak…
Petra
23 Apr 2008I first visited Petra when I was living in Cairo in 2000 and so some of the photos are from that trip. Pre-digital camera days for me meant that the scanned photos lack the sharpness of the other photos taken on a more recent trip in April 2008. Petra. But what an amazing place. Emerging from the canyon almost too narrow for a horse and cart and then to be confronted by the ancient treasury chiselled out of the sandstone…
Wadi Mujib
22 Jun 2008Wadi Mujib is one of the undiscovered gems of Jordan. If you are travelling along the King’s Highway you will need to cross this huge canyon. There are some pictures on the king’s highway page, but for this trip we went to where the wadi reaches the Dead Sea. Here the canyon is sheer and narrow and there are some convenient cabins nearby, right on the Dead Sea, in which to spend the night. These photos are from a trip…
Aqaba & Wadi Rum
22 Aug 2008August in Amman is damned hot, so where do we go on holiday? To Aqaba where it’s even hotter! Aqaba has one big advantage though. It’s by the sea – the Red Sea which is fantastic for diving and that’s why we went. We stayed three nights in Aqaba at the Al Cazar Hotel and then another night camping in the amazingly beautiful Wadi Rum before heading back up north. There are plenty of dive sites all along the coast…
Dana but not Dana
We had friends visiting us in August 2008 so we took the opportunity of visiting one of the top natural attractions of Jordan, Dana Nature Reserve. Basically, millions of years ago the surface of the Earth ruptured round these parts creating a huge rift valley. The land on the west went down and the land on the east went up. On the west you’ve got the Dead Sea valley and the lowest place on Earth. On the East you’ve got…
Northern Ruins
23 Nov 2008Northern ruins describes a number of disparate trips we did in the north of the country. Including to Jerash, the most famous Roman ruins in Jordan, Umm Qais, another Roman site but beautifully situated above the sea of Galillee, more Roman ruins at the attractively sited Pella and Machaerus, the citadel overlooking the Dead Sea where John the Baptist lost his head. I’ve also included trips to the town of Madaba famous for its churches and mosaics and the forest…