Jordan

Exchange rates:

1 $ = 0.708 JD
1 DKR = 0.130 JD
1 JD = 1.4 $
1 JD = 7.7 DKR

The Border

At the border we met a Canadian girl, Nika, travelling alone, and we teamed up with her for the next couple of days. The border formalities took several hours. A visa was JD12 for Danish citizens, and roughly the same for most other nationalities; except the Canadians who had to cough up with JD31... There is two banks at the border. Neither accept Visa Card. Both have the same rates, but one of them has a lower commission on travellers cheques - that was JD3.

We arrived in Amman at 12:30 and wanted to continue directly to Petra. So we got a taxi and asked the driver to go to the bus station for Petra. He kept claiming that there were no more transportation for Petra today - except ordinary taxi. We didn't trust this. He then brought us to the wrong bus station and took off. We got a local bus to the right bus station, the Wahadat station in the southern part of Amman, arriving at two in the afternoon. From there we immidiately got a service taxi to Petra (JD3 each + JD0.5 each for the luggage) arriving at five or six in the evening.

Petra

In Petra we spent a while looking around for a cheap room. At a hotel [petra1.jpg][petra2.gif] which was not completely built yet, they claimed to be able to provide the cheapest accomodation when the workers have finished their job. We ended up staying in the Petra Gate hotel near the roundabout in the center of Wadi Musa; after tough bargaining we got a tripple without shower for JD12. Later on we talked to other travellers, and it sounds like the Al-Anbat Hotel or the Mussa Spring Hotel are still the cheapest; however they lie far from the entrance to Petra. Dinner at Al-Anbat is a bit expensive (JD4) but is probably the best food in town.

November 1st.

Got up a bit late. Ate breakfast in our hotel (JD1 each - at Al-Anbat it's included) and reached the entrance to Petra at 11 o'clock. The tickets are extremely expensive: JD20 for a one day pass, JD25 for a two day pass and JD30 for a three day pass. That's outragous since they are using the money for rather stupid things like making an asfalt road from the entrance to the Arched Gate... And it was really going to blow our budgets.

We had heard that people have successfully sneaked into the site in different ways. We tried to walk in through a detour, but we were stopped and brought back to the entrance. Luckily they didn't make us pay the JD50 fine. I guess there is only one fairly safe way to sneak in: 1) Get up in the middle of the night (bring a flashlight) and walk in through a detour around Little Petra, 2) Hide for a couple of hours until the tour groups start pouring in, 3) Mix with the other tourists and hope that nobody will ask to see your ticket. The problem is, that you will have a hard time finding your way when you haven't been to the site before. I'm sure that the authorities already know of this trick, so it's a bit risky.

Nevertheless, Petra is an astonishing area and should not be missed if you go to Jordan. But perhaps you should skip Jordan until the fee to Petra becomes reasonable again... some locals were certain that this was going to happen sooner or later.

We went to the High Place of Sacrifice and down past the Tomb of the Roman Soldier, etc.

November 2nd.

It had been raining in the morning, so unfortunately a tough trip like going up the Umm al-Biyara wasn't appealing. In return, the Monestary is a breathtaking piece of rock...

The museum inside Petra is small but informative. For once, there was good and extensive explanations in English.

As we planned to ride camels and go camping in Wadi Rum the next day, we looked into a trip arranged by La Beduina Tours (phone (03-) 336 930) whose logo you will see in many souvenir shops [petra3.jpg]. They arrange all kids of caravan trips and trips by jeep in the area. But they were very expensive - they wanted JD61 per person for a five hour camel ride and beduin housing + a guide... too much for us. We decided just to go the next morning and see what was going to happen.

In the evening we watched Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, like everyone else. Luckly, we met a guy, Machmoud, who offered to take os to Wadi Rum in the morning.

November 3rd.

First thing in the morning we bought supplies for the evening's camping. We took off at 10 o'clock after the last of several quarrels with the rather un-reliable hotel management.

Wadi Rum

Machmoud was a true Jordanian stud, no doubt excited about the blond Canadian girl. He played it really cool as he drove his Mercedes: Drove without touching the wheel, stopped to say hello to friends once in a while, poured us Whiskey+Coke while driving. We arrived safely at the Government Resthouse. For JD1 each they promised to keep our spare luggage for the night.

We hired three camels to a destination 7-10 kilometers away (about two hours of riding), paying JD16 each. Riding the camel was a lot of fun and the surroundings were breathtaking. We got dropped off and the camel-owners took their camels back to their village. In a cleft, we found a nice place with shelter to camp in. We made a fire from some of the many dry branches lying around the cleft.

November 4th.

After breakfast we walked for a couple of hours back to the government resthouse and got our stuff. At 12 o'clock there was a bus to Aquaba.

Aquaba

While waiting for the banks to open in the afternoon, we had great but very expensive pizzas at Pizza Hut. The only bank which handled Visa in the afternoon was the Cairo-Amman Bank (no commision). Kasper and I bought tickets to Amman for the next day (Jett bus, JD4 a ticket). Finally we bought beers in a liquor store opposite the post office.

We went to the Aquaba Hotel expecting to stay at their campground. The prices had certainly gone up since the guide book was written - they wanted JD6 per person... So we took a taxi to the National Touristic Camp about five kilometers down the cost. Camping was JD1 each.

We were not the only ones there. Among the other guests were a bus with 20 English boys and girls on their way to Nepal.

While drinking our beer we met Halid, who seemed to live permanently at the beach. As he couldn't write English, he asked us to write a letter to his Italian girlfriend in his name.

November 5th.

Breakfast at the beach 'restaurant' was JD1 each.

It was a rather windy day, but still it was warm enough to swim and lie on the beach. Snorkelling off the camping ground's beach was OK, but going about 1 kilometer further down the cost to the next beach was better. There were fish of many psychedelic colors and fine corals. But it didn't fully live up to our expectations - some people said pollution had destroyed a lot of the underwater beauty; it could be that it's still a great place if you dive from a boat, though.

Aquaba has a great view of the gulf where four countries meet almost in swimming distance. And it's said that the weather in Aquaba is always good.

At three o'clock we left for Amman, Nika went to Israel.

Amman

In Amman we looked at a few hotels and decided to stay at the Riyadh hotel: [amman1.jpg]. A double was JD8. The rooms and bathrooms were clean.

In the evening we wanted to make some calls to Denmark. Ordinary collect calls are not available in Jordan, but systems resembling it - like the "Denmark Direct" system are supposed to work. With that system, you call a local toll free number, get switched to the right number in your home country and then the receiver (hopefully) acceps to pay. It didn't work, though - we found out, that these services had been closed down for a couple of weeks, nobody knew why. Outside the telephone office were a lot of small, private offices. There they allowed you to call for one minute (not one more second) and ask the party at home to call the office. This arrangement was a farily good solution at JD1.6; the government run telephone office charged JD1.3/minute but didn't accept the call-back solution.

November 6th.

The Dead Sea

Getting to the Dead Sea took longer than we had expected. The problem is finding the right bus station, which is the one on Jerusalem Street, as written in the guide book. Unfortunately, the taxi driver couldn't find it; it may be quicker just to walk. We waited 10 minutes for the bus to fill up - the fare was 400 fils each. The bus stopped at Shuneh where we were supposed to catch another local bus. We were a bit late, so we took a taxi (JD3) to the resort. This should be "Dead Sea Resort" in Arabic: [deadsea.jpg]. Entrance was JD1 and a locker was half a dinar.

We floated around for a while, took a shower and caught the 4:30 bus to Amman. The driver tried to make us pay a fortune, but we pointed at the sign with prices to indicate that we intented to pay the fixed amount which was around 600 fils each.

Back in Amman we picked up our stuff, got something to eat and took a taxi to the airport (JD8). Airport tax was JD10 each.

November 7th.

After a lot of transfers we landed in Copenhagen at 11 am.

Wait - there's more notes...

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