Desert Safari

We left Wadi Musa (Petra) and bumbed a ride with a couple that had a rental car down to Wadi Rum. Wadi Rum is a huge desolate but beautiful desert that has been the home to Bedouins for thousands of years. It is also the area where Lawrence of Arabia fought and lived. They also filed the movie Lawrence of Arabia there as well. We hooked up with our Bedouin guide and we headed out into the desert in his vintage Toyota Land Cruiser. The local town is filled with Vintage Toyotas. It seems to be the only vehicle that can take the constant abuse in the desert. Ours was set up with a hardcab in the front and a pickup type bed in the back with troop seats and canvas roof to keep the harsh sun off our heads.

Our trip in the desert was once again undescribeable. So many amazing colors and beautiful rock formations. This isnt the type of desert that you see in Nevada with large stretches of white sand. The desert here is red sand with gigantic red rock formations up to 30 stories tall that are decomposing and look like melting plastic. The life in the desert for the bedouins is harsh to say the least. Its a very spartan existance.

At night we camped out in the desert with the Bedoiuns in a tent. The sunset was amazing, casting a bright glow over the rocks and sand. Just unbelievable. I was looking forward to seeing the stars at night, but we had a full moon. There were hardly and stars out, but the moon did glow so bright that you could clearly see everything almost as clear as day. We didnt need a flashlight, we could even see the hills way accross the valley. The desert at night has to be the quitest place on earth so peaceful and serene. I would highly recomend a desert trek to anyone going to the middle east. It may have been better then Petra.

yesterday we made the trek down to Aqaba. The southern most city in Jordan. It is only 3 KM from Saudi Arabia and right across the red sea from Egypt. We caught a ride with a man from Lebanon and his wife. While driving south we came upon one of the many military checkpoints in Jordan. We had to show our passports to the guards and ended up having us pull over and go to an office for additional questioning. I think it is because we were with the man from Lebanon. After a few questions we were on our way again. At some point in this checkpoint ordeal a very friendly soilder was questioning me with his machine gun pointed at my stomach. It wasnt in a mean or menacing way, but I didnt really feel too good about it. He had it just thrown over his shoulder haphazardly. I guess when you live here you get used to things like that. For instance on the beach at the red sea in Aqaba instead of 19 year old lifeguards patrolling the beaches on quads, you have 19 year soilders patrolling the beaches in Toyota trucks with 50 calaber machine guns. We should feel very fortunate at home to not live under the same fears that they do here.

Tomorrow we are off to Egypt the land of Pyaramids. We will post again soon.