Beautiful Petra and the beautiful Bedouin!
Trip Start
Sep 18, 2008
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20
50
Trip End
Dec 07, 2008
Where I stayed
What an awesome day! It was hard work in parts but I had so much fun. We got up at 5:30am to have a shower (we weren't allowed to have one directly after the Turkish Bath) and we left the hotel at 7am. By about 7:30am we were on our way into Petra (only after going past the Indiana Jones Souvenir Shop). Petra was built in the 3rd C BC by the Nabataeans who carved palaces, temples, tombs, storerooms and stables into the sandstone cliffs. The stone in Petra is what makes this place so extraordinary. The colour does change in parts but it is predominantly a red kind of colour with numerous other colours running through it. No one really knows much about the Nabataeans except for their village. The Bedouins moved into the site and once it started becoming a popular tourist destination they were moved to just above the main attractions and they now run most of the activities throughout the valley. To enter Petra you need to walk through the impressive siq. The siq is not a natural canyon - it was once a long blocl but due to earthquakes it has been ripped apart leaving some interesting rock formations, including one which on the side it looks like a fish and then when you look from the front it looks like an elephant. Before entering the siq you walk past a few monuments which have designs based on the other prosperous cultures of the time. Walking through the siq you have to be careful not to be run down by the horse drawn carriages and as we learnt - be careful of walking and staring at the treasury rather than where you are puting your feet. As Naim was telling us something a tourist fell over a rock she hadn't noticed and she grazed her face and had a blood nose. But, once you turn the last corner of the siq the true beauty of the site hits you as you get the first glimpse of the treasury through the narrow exit of the siq. The treasury is truely amazing! The facade of the treasury was a beatiful rose colour and the size of the structure is amazing. Outside the treasury, the Bedouins dress up in what is supposed to be traditional costume of the Nabataeans. After the treasury we continued walking and came across the street of facades which contains rows of Nabataean tombs. We then split into 2 groups - those who wanted to climb and those who didn't (I didn't). Those of us who didn't climb, we walked past the theatre and we also got to walk up to some of the caves and see the different colours running through the stone. While the rest of the group kept climbing, we shopped. In Petra there is a NZ woman who married one of the Bedouins. She then wrote a very good book about it and now sells the book from Petra and signs each copy. Her husband died a few years ago but she now works at the site with her son Raami who we also met and speaks English with a combination of a Brit/Aussie and Kiwi accent - he did go to school in Sydney. We then went to the place where we would be getting our lunch bag from. The guy that runs the place was called Mohammed and boy was he hot!!! He wore a turban tied in a very cool way and wore kohl around his eyes. Jamie likes him as well and said that he works out 3 times a day and would have an amazing body. All the women of our group stared for a bit! After lunch we started the hike up to the monastery which is a do not miss site in Petra. To get to the monastery you first have to walk along the colonnaded street and past the continuing excavations and past the donkey and camel renters shouting things like "taxi to the top", "air conditioned taxi" and "Bedouin Ferrari". It was very funny. You then climb a path scattered with 800 steps to reach the monastery. It was hot, tiring and hard but the changes in colour of the stone and the end result are very much worth it. On the way up we stopped at the tomb of the lions where you could just make out the carvings of the lions. The monastery was huge and with no clear path up it, it was interesting to see a young Bedouin boy perched in between 2 high parts of the structure. After a sit down and a drink we started the walk back down. We got down much more quickly than going up and then we did some more shopping. I bought a couple of scarves and the Married to a Bedouin book. We then started our walk back to the bus. The walk back down the siq was very long as I had a blister on my heel and it was really hot. It had already been a long day and we still hadn't reached our bedouin camp. We had spent 8.5 hours at Petra and I was ready to sit down and relax. We got to the Bedouin camp and it was not what I had expected. I thought it would be just our group sleeping in 1 or 2 large tents and a long drop. Not quite! There would have been at least 100 2 person tents with beds, there was at least one other group there, the seating areas all had concrete floors and the toilets were divided into mens and womens and were tiled. Tea wasn't going to be until 8 so we had a cup of tea and then started on our own drinks and then played cards. It was then time to watch them pull our dinner out of the fire pit. I was really looking forward to dinner cos as soon as it started cooking it smelled like a webber. Dinner was great - salads and dips, mashed potato, pasta salad, roast potatoes (tasted just like webber potatoes), roast lamb and roast chicken. It was the best dinner I'd had in ages. After dinner we went into the tent area that had the fire burning and we listened to the Bedouins play music. I ended up sleeping out here rather than in the tent becuase it was really comfortable. Will write more about the next later. Bye
