Adventures in Petra ... the Treasury

My contract in the UAE ended December 31st. And I had some vacation time to use. Tim and I decided to go to a country that was easy to get to from the UAE, but maybe not as easy from the U.S.  

Petra, Jordan has long been on our list of places we want to see.

Turns out that Jordan is just a 3 hour flight from Abu Dhabi, non-stop.

Through a friend at work, I got connected with a gentleman who organizes personal tours. (You can arrange for tours through the country's tourism website, but we liked the idea of supporting an individual, and the cost was comparable.)

Our trip included, in order: Mt. Nebo, Madaba, Karak Castle, Petra, Wadi Rum, Dead Sea, AlJoun Castle, Jerash, and a bit of Amman.  I'm going to start with Petra, though ... it was as stunning as you would expect, and didn't disappoint. (Sometimes things or places get talked up and built up, and then you see them in person, and you go "oh".  Not Petra. You see Petra and you go "wow!" ... if you can get any words out.)

The hotel we stayed at was the Petra Guest House. It was the closest hotel to the entrance of Petra. The timing of our trip had us arriving in Petra the evening of December 23rd. That evening, we had tickets for "Petra at Night", where you walk the 1 or so kilometers through the Siq (canyon), to the Treasury.  It's interesting to navigate that passageway at night, with hundreds candles in bags along the way and in front of the Treasury. And other people navigating in the darkness, too. It's not an even pathway, so I took my time.

While the Treasury by candlelight was lovely, seeing it by day was stunning.

With your ticket into Petra, you can ride in by horse. But friends and the guidebooks encourage entering by foot, so that you can soak in the visual. And I think they are right.

And then you are in front of this famous edifice. Awesome.

A very long time ago, names were given to the tombs in Petra, and the "Treasury" was one of them. I need to go back to my Jordan guidebook and give more history and facts in one of these posts. But for now, photos and personal narrative.

We wanted to have as much time as possible inside Petra, so we headed in early. The sunlight hitting the Treasury in the morning, and the Monastery in the afternoon, is quite breath-taking. (More on the Monastery and other areas of Petra soon.)

There are donkeys and camels hanging around the Treasury, as guides invite visitors to ride instead of walk through the canyons.

(I didn't know that the bottom of camels' feet were soft. I had assumed they would be more horse-like.)

I do want to share a couple of people photos.  I mentioned that you can ride through the Siq and enter Petra on a horse (or by horse cart). These gentleman keep those paths very clean for those who choose to walk.

You'll notice in some of my Petra photos that people are bundled up a bit ... it was quite chilly!

The photo of the two men above, they are sitting in front of a water channel that runs the length of the Siq. The Nabataeans, long ago, carved these out of the sandstone, diverting flood waters and enabling fresh water for residents' use. (Not that long ago, beduoins were still living in the caves of Petra.)

Also along the canyon walls are remnants of carvings in the walls. Water, wind, and sand have eroded the delicate features. Here the lower half of a statue of a man, probably a soldier.

And what was a camel carving. (You can make out the camel feet.)