Day Seven

On Thursday we woke up to a beautiful morning in Eilat and caught a taxi to the Yitzhak Rabin (Arava) border crossing. It was a relatively easy process to cross into Jordan at that checkpoint; everything is run pretty efficiently. While we were waiting at the passport check, we met a lovely Austrian couple. (Andrew enjoyed a brief conversation in German with them...I looked on enviously, wishing I knew how to speak at least one other language. It's officially on my lifetime "to do" list!) Their names were Thomas and Sarah, and they were very nice. We agreed to split a taxi to Petra, which was about a 2 hour ride from the border (and would only cost us 10 dinars apiece - approx. $12 - split four ways). Our taxi driver, Aref, was wonderful. He stopped a few places along the way to point out various sites of interest, including a coffee stand (where he treated the coffee drinkers - Andrew and Thomas - to some Arabic coffee) and an overlook with beautiful views of the Jordanian countryside. We liked Aref so much that we asked if we could have a picture of him, to remember him by:When we reached Petra at about 11 am, Aref dropped us off at the Sela Hotel, where we had a reservation, and we bid our new friends good-bye. The experience at the Sela Hotel was less than desirable. Andrew had booked us a room online through a booking agent, and even after showing the hotel employees the reservation confirmation online, they refused to honor it. They then informed us that they had one available room, but it would cost 50 dinars each rather than the 50 dinars total that was part of the original reservation agreement. The kicker was that the guy told us we could only pay cash for the room. He claimed that the credit card system for the whole city of Petra was down for the last two days, and refused to even try to swipe Andrew's card. Needless to say, we hightailed it out of that place...it was all very shady.

At this point, we were pretty stressed...we were in an unfamiliar foreign city with nowhere to stay. In desperation we tried the Amra Palace, a very nice hotel that Andrew had actually tried to book a few weeks ago, but was told that it was packed full. When we told the front desk manager at the Amra Palace our saga, he was incredibly nice. We waited in the comfortable lounge while he scrambled to try and find us a room. The staff there were very gracious; they brought us glasses of fresh pomegranate juice while we anxiously waited, praying that something would work out. Our prayers were answered - the manager found us a room for the night! We were so relieved. (And doggone it, wouldn't you know, when the manager swiped Andrew's credit card, it worked!! Miracle of miracles!) We had the last laugh on the Sela Hotel, though -- see our review of the Sela Hotel experience on TripAdvisor.com.

Anyway...from the Amra Palace it was on to Petra. I'm pretty much going to let the following pictures speak for themselves, though they don't really do the place any justice. It was just unbelievable to see these huge structures carved right into the sandstone. It was absolutely breathtaking...one of the most amazing places I've ever seen.

Upon entering the site, there is a 1.2 km. path called the Siq. (Pronounced "seek," not "sick"; unfortunately, Andrew found the pun "Siq and you shall find" irresistible.) It leads you to Petra's most photographed monument, the Treasury, which was featured in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Here's a shot of our approach to the Treasury from the Siq: Here's the Treasury itself:
And again, another obligatory camel shot:
From the Treasury, we decided to hike the 800+ stairs to the Monastery (Al-Deir). It was quite a hike! Here's a view from the trail up to the Monastery:
And a shot of us upon our arrival, about half an hour later:
Another short hike up from the Monastery was "Sacrifice Lookout" - I'm not entirely certain of the history of that name, though I'm fairly certain that I'd be able to come up with a decent hypothesis! The view was indescribable. Hopefully these pictures will give you a sense of the place:
Here's a shot of us on our way back down toward the Monastery:
By the time we made it back down to the Treasury and through the Siq, our legs were about ready to fall off. Then we had another thirty minute walk uphill to our hotel, where we rested for a couple of hours before heading out again at 8:30 pm to a special tour called Petra By Night, which involves a walk through the Siq, lined with hundreds of luminaries, to the Treasury. Once at the Treasury (which was also illuminated by hundreds of candles), Bedouin musicians treated us to their traditional music and also some hot tea. Between the stillness of the night, the majesty of the Treasury, and the unbelievable view of the night sky, it was a pretty magical experience.

We had no problem falling asleep that night!