Saturday, March 1st – Monday, March 3rd, 2025
World Tour Days 118 – 120
After finishing up in Amman, Nick, Deb, Jeff, and I started the drive to Wadi Musa, the village we would have as a home base to explore Petra. On the drive we stopped at Qasr Al-Harranah, a castle built before 710 A.D in the middle of nowhere. We got to explore inside, which had empty rooms and stairwells all facing into an open courtyard.
For lunch we stopped at a place in Dana Village. This is near where Deb & Jeff had spent some time hiking before Nick and I met them in Amman. A hotel served us platters of food on a rooftop terrace. It was all delicious and the dog that hung out there was adorable.
When we arrived to our hotel, the host showed us an amazing sunset spot. He was very kind. The hotel had an enclosed terrace with views of the city. It was cozy with heaters, sheep skins, rugs, and other decor. We spent a lot of time in there drinking tea.
The first day in Petra, a new wonder of the world for us, was awesome. We opted to get there at opening to have it be quieter. The four of us were there with only guards, camel and donkey owners, and a couple of tourists that were spread out across the large city. We had been emotionally prepared to be there with massive crowds, but that was never the case. The trail starts by going through the Siq, which is a 1.2km long sandstone gorge. This is the entrance to Petra, opening up to The Treasury. There are parts where the original paved road remains.
The Treasury, the only place we knew about ahead of time, was beautiful. Throughout the day it changed color slightly depending on the lighting. It was darker at opening and when we left in the late afternoon it was more orange. It was impressive to see something so large carved from the cliff. By the treasury were men selling fresh squeezed pomegranate and lemon mint juice, and people who would let visitors ride their camels for a photo in front of the treasury for a fee. We enjoyed the juice but did not partake in the camel ride. Deb did try and get a camel to kiss her hand like she saw another tourist do but did not succeed.
We spent the first day walking the main trail including the Main Theater, Royal Tombs, Great Temple, Qasr al-Bint Temple, Street of Facades, and the Monastery. We also accidentally found the trail that takes visitors to an arial view point of the treasury: Al-Khubtha Trail. Someone told us that they used to charge people to go up there so we were happy that was not the case when we went. Nick and I also found a trail that gave an arial view point of the Main Theater. When posing for a picture a cat came up and sat on my lap and would not leave me alone.
The trail to the Monastery was many stairs leading through endless vendors selling the same scarves and trinkets. It was an hour of endless donkey ride and trinket selling attempts. Once we arrived to the top there was a cafe with a long deck where we sat and enjoyed the view of the Monastery. The Monastery reminded us of the treasury.
There were donkeys tied up after having carried people up the trail and about a dozen dogs. Some of the dogs were nice but others were a bit aggressive. Every time a new dog and donkey came up the trail there was a group of about 5 dogs who would go absolutely crazy, barking, snarling, chasing, etc. Two girls were changing scarfs, taking many of the same video and picture for several minutes in front of the Monastery. When the dogs went after a new dog they ended up gathering around the girls purses and peed on them. It was probably funnier for us then it was for them.
After many hours of exploring Petra we went back home in the late afternoon. A full day is definitely necessary for seeing all of the highlights. Dinner was a huge spread made by our host’s mother. We enjoyed it with the other guests, a family from Italy.
The next day our plan was to see the last areas we hadn’t explored yet. This started with the Trail to the High Place of Sacrifice. The trail up had little to see but the place of High Sacrifice itself was neat. The route we took down, Wadi Al-Farasa, had many tombs and ruins to look at making it much more interesting. This included the Lion Triclinium, Lion Fountain, Garden Hall, Colored Triclinium, Solider Tomb, Renaissance Tomb, and more.
Before lunch we walked to the Church Complex which had remaining mosaics on the floor. In the area we also saw the Temple of the Winged Lions. This was the most in ruin ruin we had seen at Petra, very little was intact. I did see a long snake going through the rubble pile, though, which was cool.
After lunch we attempted to do the Sabra trail with debatable success. One of the funny things about Petra is that the local people who live in the caves nearby, the ones who sell trinkets and donkey rides, vandalize the signs. There are signs for different trails that illustrate how long they will take to walk, how difficult, and how many steps they have. The signs include details about the building or ruin to see as well. The information that would help us decide if we could do the trail or not was almost always scratched out, such as distance and difficulty. Then someone would be there to tell us it was impossible to do without a donkey.
The Sabra trail is somewhat difficult to follow as there are many roads branching off of it leading to local homes. We ended up walking more randomly and saw some baby camels. Deb wanted a different route home so we followed a goat trail back to the main area instead of the road. I’ll admit I was skeptical about this choice at first, but it ended up being fine with nice views and no harassment. Nick captured a great shot of one of the temples from above on our way back too.
We had dinner at the Jordanian Heritage Restaurant and it was fabulous. The makmoura was a table favorite which was a crunchy layered pie with chicken and onions. Everything we ate there was amazing, though. At a local bakery after dinner a man insisted we try a special baklava dessert with cinnamon. It ended up being our favourite one we tried. We also got the ‘Dubai Chocolate’, a chocolate bar with pistachio and knafeh which is super crispy. Two days felt like a perfect amount of time to explore Petra.
