Monday April 1^st

Aqaba. Jordan

Well I did sleep more than a wink last night. We finally ran into some oh so slightly but sufficiently rough weather that I was gently rocked to sleep by the motion. And didn’t wake up until my phone texted me to welcome me to Israel, at the same time as Brian’s phone welcomed him to Egypt. Well, we must be in Jordan then!

Aqaba is the sea port for Jordan, and is very close to Israel, Egypt and Saudi Arabia – this is probably as close to Saudi Arabia as we are going to get for a while.

We had a large breakfast (we will be having lunch at 3:00 PM) and headed down to the Royal Court Theater to await our bus for our ship’s Petra tour. We are a bit late getting down there, and already 22 buses had headed off to the Lost City. We got our stickers for our bus, which turned out to be the one from the last bus. No matter, we were quickly called to join the tour, and with backpacks heavy with our needs for the day off we headed for the gangway, and our coach that was awaiting us. The coach was absolutely full, but we did manage to find 2 seats together.

The bus ride to Petra takes about 2 hours, and we had a bathroom break stop on the way. The place where we stopped had some very nice, but ridiculously expensive souvenirs, and so we avoided making any purchases, hoping for better luck in Petra itself. It was also jolly cold there, the tour office wasn’t joking when they recommended dressing in layers. I had all of my layers on already.

On arrival in Petra we, and the passengers of the other 23 buses, together with the passengers from the Costa Victoria which was berthed right behind us in Aqaba, and sundry bus loads of other sightseers, converged on the entrance to the Lost City. It was all actually quite well organized despite the hoards of people, and we set off on our trek to the Treasury. We had not gone far before we had already lost 2 members of our group. Whilst we were waiting for them to catch up we were pestered by men trying to talk us in to riding a horse or taking a carriage ride. We had been warned that it was not safe to do so, and although it was still quite early in the day, their horses looked exhausted already. No thank you, not for us.

Once we were a whole group again, we continued on the long downhill path towards the Treasury. I had thought that there would be nothing to see along the way, but I was wrong. We stopped at several places to see old tombs and sculptures in the rock. It was all so beautiful, that momentarily I forgot the hoards around us, and the fact that I couldn’t hear a word our guide was saying with the noisy people around us.

Finally we reached the entrance to the Siq, and started walking along the ancient path taken by those before us for centuries. I had really been looking forward to doing this, imagining that it would be a mystical and spiritual experience.

It was not. The hoards of people kept cutting in front of you and stepping on your toes, everyone was incredibly noisy, my eyes were nearly poked out by a selfie stick, and the carriages came at you at an alarming rate, so you had to keep on diving out of their way. It felt more like being in the middle of the Souk on market day.

Still, it was amazing to be walking in the red stone canyon with its walls rising high above us. For a minute I forgot about the chaos around me and just absorbed the incredible beauty of the Siq. This is how I imagined it would be, nature is so perfect in so many ways. I would not have missed the experience for anything.

Then the moment we had all been waiting for arrived, as you turn a corner, there through a narrow opening is the Treasury peeping at you. It looks so unreal, and the juxtaposition of the beauty of nature and the incredible creativity of man is staring you in the face. You want to just stand there and savor that moment, but a voice behind you yells, “watch out!” and you jump out of the path of the carriage bearing down on you. That moment of wander is passed, but the memory will always be there.

The Treasury is even more spectacular than it appears in photos. It is hard to believe that it is carved out of stone, and has stood there all these years, intact for the most part. Of course it is not really a treasury, but a very elaborate tomb. However, it really is a treasure in the artistic sense, a true wonder of the modern world.

After fighting with the other tourists to try to get a good photo, and avoiding the camels who were waiting to have someone sit on them so they could be photographed, we fought our way through the throng of men selling cheap jewellery, and boys selling postcards, to explore what else Petra has to offer.

We spent the next couple of hours wandering around looking at the other tombs, and the incredible amphitheater. We didn’t have enough time to climb up and see the rest that Petra has to offer as our guide said it was time for our late lunch, and so we headed back to the town.

It was a long uphill walk, but looking at the Siq from a new angle showed us more of the beauty of Petra. By the time we reached the hotel we were quite tired out from our walk and ready for a good meal. We passed a donkey along the way who looked like I felt.

We had a buffet lunch at the Petra Palace Hotel, who did an amazing job of feeding 24 coach loads of hungry cruise passengers. They were very well organized, and I really admired them. I have trouble organizing a dinner party for 8, let alone scores of people who are used to being fed every hour.

After lunch there was time for shopping. We stocked up on soft drinks, and bought T shirts with a cute stylized camel on them.

There was some confusion about where to meet our bus. The other groups had been told to assemble in the hotel lobby and their guide would then escort them to the bus. Our guide had pointed vaguely to a car park up the hill and told us to be there at 4:30. At 4:15 the majority of us were there waiting obediently, but there was no coach. Our guide showed up and looked quite flummoxed about the lack of transportation, still no sign of our coach. Finally it did show up, and after our guide got in to a very heated argument with some official looking man, and it was appearing that a physical altercation was going to be inevitable, we were instructed to board the coach.

We thought that we were ready to head back to the ship, but one couple was missing, and we waited another half hour until they finally showed up.

We stopped for a bathroom break at another expensive souvenir establishment on the way back. We have a rule that anything we buy has to have some kind of useful property, and cannot just be yet another item for me to dust on the shelf as it joins all of the other treasures from our adventures. T-shirts are OK, wooden ornaments are not. I came across the cutest little camel. It would come in to the totally unacceptable category under normal circumstances, but it looked pleadingly at me, and next thing I knew I had bought it.

I like camels, and it has tiny little mosaic tiles all over it, making it look very Gaudiesc (?spelling). I though it could work for our Barcelona souvenir too.

We got back to the ship after 7:30. It had been a long day, and according to Brian’s watch which doesn’t only tell the time (not always in the right time zone), we had walked for nearly 7 miles. It certainly felt like it.

As we got off the bus we were greeted by several officers, and given a glass of champagne. There are several things that Cunard does that are so right. This was one of them. A glass of champagne was exactly what I needed. Thank you!

Our day in Petra had been wonderful. The Cunard tour was good, but we thought we could have done so much more if we had done a private tour. A lot of time was wasted with bathroom breaks and waiting for other passengers. Being part of a big crowd it was difficult to hear what our guide was saying, and seeing as the ship didn’t sail until after 11:00 PM there would not be my usual angst about getting back to the ship on time. Still, I’m glad I did it!

As we sailed out of Aqaba I was sad to be leaving our last Middle Eastern port. I have loved all of the things we have seen, and the local people we have met. The sights and smells have been enchanting. We have had a great time, but now Europe looms on the distant horizon, metaphorically speaking of course. It’s near midnight and dark out there, nothing to be seen on the horizon at the moment.