| Submitted by: John Mittler, Finland |
| Submission Date: 28 March 2007 |
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I was directed to another platform nearby, but soon a man in uniform came to explain that also this was the wrong queue, and I should hurry to a bus that was just about to leave. I did so, but again the driver told that his bus is not going to Petra, and the man in uniform must have made a mistake.
The man in uniform orchestrated yet two or three changes of platforms and queues, until I finally was sitting in the correct bus with other foreign tourists, next to a young man from Japan. Majority of the passengers in the bus were local people, and the ticket price was moderate, less than ten dollars. The bus left at 15:10, and the 270 km long trip to Petra took less than three hours, with a 15-minute pause at halfway.
During the pause at a gasoline station I visited the toilet, which was the standard western model (not the “hole in the floor” version that is still quite commonly used in the Middle East). It seemed that no cleaning or maintenance work of any kind had been performed in the toilet for several years: the stench was indescribable, and the doors of some toilet closets were either out of place or hanging askew from one hinge only.
I took the camera out of my pocket to take a photo of the toilet, but then I decided to save my artistic creativity for more cultivated purposes, and photographed this double-decker animal transportation vehicle, on the parking lot of the gasoline station.
As we continued driving towards Wadi Musa and Petra, the bus driver listened to Arabic music from the radio. But then one of the passengers offered a Koran cassette to the driver, and for an hour we listened to Koran verses slowly recited in ceremonial style, and played as loud as the car stereo was able to perform.
I checked in at Petra Gate hostel at 18:10, and spent the rest of the evening with other foreign tourists in the lobby of the hostel. One young lady was from USA, another lady from Norway, two young men from Italy, one from Canada, one from Britain, and several backpackers from Russia.
It was so cold in the hostel rooms that I slept with jeans and jacket on, under the blankets. The chilly temperature of the water did not entice me to take a shower, and naturally there was no toilet paper in the room. I opened the drawer of the night table next to my bed, and found a half-eaten bread — left there by the previous visitor, I hope, but possibly the one before that, or then the one before the one...
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Wed 27 December 2006
A wake-up call from the local mosques welcomed me into a new bright day at 5 o’clock. I felt a bit heavy, and soon noticed that I had fever and flu. I went back to sleep, expecting the fever to be gone in an hour or two. I seldom have fever in daytime.
I woke up again after 6 o’clock, but somehow the day seemed less bright now. The lights did not function in the room, neither in the corridor. The entire town of Wadi Musa was out of electricity, for an hour or so. I used the display of a palm computer as flashlight, and wandered to the dining room, where the cook of the hostel was serving bread and omelettes for breakfast.
The weather was cold and wet, and some of the tourists stayed in the hostel all day because of the unpleasant weather. The manager of the hostel drove me and a Canadian guy to ancient Petra, and we started walking along the Siq canyon towards the Treasury (which became famous as the Temple of Doom in an Indiana Jones movie). I was wearing sneakers (jogging shoes), but I managed to pass the 1.2 km long Siq canyon without getting wet feet.
The rain stopped soon, but the weather was still cold and windy. The wind was so strong that it was difficult to stand or walk on top of the cliffs. Most of the tourists stayed in the deep canyons, but I climbed on the cliffs with the Canadian young man, to get the best photo angles and to visit some of the palace tombs.
Petra is located on high mountains, and on cloudy weather (which is extremely rare here) the mountain tops are covered by a thick fog of clouds. As we proceeded towards el-Deir monastery, which is the farthest and highest monument of Petra, the weather became more and more foggy, and in some places the wind was so strong that every step forward required a considerable effort.
Two donkeys were carrying merchandise from the low valleys to the shopkeepers on top of the mountains, without anyone attending them. For a few dollars we would have gotten a donkey ride onto the top of el-Deir, but the Canadian guy was not interested in the offer, so I declined it too.
When we arrived on top of el-Deir, there was no more than 50 m visibility in the thick fog, and it was impossible to get a good photo of the monument. The photo above was taken from the distance of 25 meters or so — a few steps backwards would have made the entire building disappear into the fog. We were not alone here: we found three Italian women in the monastery, and more tourists were coming up when we descended back to the canyons of Petra.
Our luck with the weather changed for the worse when we were on top of the high mountains. It began raining lightly, and soon the falling water turned into ice. We were not worried about the weather — we could not guess that snow was already blocking roads around Petra, and all tourists would be trapped in Petra for two days. (Some buses got stuck in snow on the mountain road leading to Petra, and nearly a hundred tourists had to sleep overnight in their buses, before being evacuated by rescue troops next day.)
It was 11 o’clock now, and I was planning to take the bus to Amman after the noon. I had reserved a room in Tel Aviv for the next night, and a flight to Cairo for the next day. We started walking towards the lower canyons with the Canadian guy, discussing our travelling plans (which would soon change), and taking photos of the ice-covered cliffs and streets of Petra.
The Canadian guy planned to visit yet some other monuments in Petra, and we parted ways near the amphitheater. I continued walking past the Treasury and through the Siq canyon, to get out of ancient Petra.
I had lost all hope of keeping my feet dry long ago, so I did not even try to avoid the water that was flooding into the canyon. Some tourists were still trying to keep their feet dry, crawling against the walls of the canyon, and complaining whenever a drip of water entered their shoes. These poor souls would soon discover that all efforts of staying dry were doomed to fail...
When I waded through this 1.2 km long canyon, filled with water ankle deep, I can assure you that I got wet from tip to toe. But I was not the only one: there were 200 other tourists trapped behind the canyon, drinking coffee and waiting for the weather to get better. This never happened, and two hours later all the tourists had to wade through these waters (which probably were deeper by then), to get out of the canyons of ancient Petra.
I tried to find a taxi to the hostel, but all taxi drivers had left their cars and gone away. Not having winter tyres, they had no chance of driving their cars up the steep roads covered by ice and snow. Policemen and soldiers were throwing each other with snow balls, and someone was building a snowman in the middle of the street.
I walked for half an hour in the rain to Wadi Musa, and when I finally reached the hostel at 12:30, all my clothes were as wet as they possibly could be. I had no exchange clothing, however, because I had planned to stay only one night in Jordan, and I had wanted to minimize the amount of luggage that I carry around in Jordan. Many other tourists were in the same situation, and we spread our only sets of clothing near the fireplaces to get them a bit less wet.
Shivering near the fireplace in the lobby (which was the only place in the hostel that was not ice-cold), I thought that there might have been better ways of treating my fever and flu than the adventures of this day. The fever returned late in the evening, and on the following days I began to cough. This flu and cough that began in Petra lasted nearly for one month.
I enquired from the hostel manager when the next bus would leave to Amman. All buses had been cancelled, because the roads were blocked by snow, but no one knew when the roads would be open again. Snow kept falling all the time, and in a few hours it became clear that all roads would remain closed at least until the next day. I reserved a room for another night in the hostel, and the other tourists did the same, having no other choice. We spent the evening dining and chatting in the lobby, and someone went to buy beer for everyone.
Finding beer is not always easy in Arab countries. If you go to an average grocery store in a Muslim country, and ask for beer, you will probably get many shrugs of shoulders in reply to your request, until someone will share his knowledge about the smaller shops in less public places, where beer will be available. Expensive hotels and restaurants usually have beer, for a tourist-oriented price.
The manager of the hostel gave directions to a place where beer was for sale at a reasonable price, and two people went there to buy beer for all of us. They brought the local Petra Beer, which has an alcohol content of 8% — twice stronger than the average beer consumed in pubs around the world. Many breweries have difficulties with beer as strong as this: the high alcohol content tends to make the taste yeasty or somewhat bitter. Petra Beer showed no sign of such weaknesses, and its taste was as clear as any average beer with half less alcohol. The scarcity of beer in this part of the world seemed to be taking no toll on its fine quality.
I did not take a photo of Petra Beer cans, but other travellers have done so, and published their photos on the Internet. Here is a link to a photo of travellers unknown to me tasting the 8% Petra Beer. (I found this pic with the Google image search.)
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Thu 28 December 2006
I woke up at 06:30 next morning, and wondered what had happened to the 5 o’clock wake-up call from the mosques. The answer became evident when I tried to turn the lights on: another electricity blackout in the town. This time the blackout lasted nearly all day, blocking access to the Internet, and silencing many cellular phone operators. My phone kept operating all the time, but many others who were using a different operator were unable to call or receive calls.
After eating breakfast at 7 o’clock, the residents of the hostel gathered in the lobby with their luggage, waiting for news about the weather and road blocks. My main concern was how to reach Ben Gurion airport before 19:50, when my flight would leave for Cairo. Some others had a ferry to catch from Aqaba to Egypt, and yet others had reserved a bus ticket from Eilat to Jerusalem.
The police reports about road blocks varied all the time, and for a while we believed that the road south to Aqaba would soon be open. Then we got new information that all power shovels were working on the road north to Amman instead, and the road to Aqaba would remain closed all day.
At 08:30 it was believed that the road to Amman would soon be open, and I entered a taxi. The taxi driver asked 150 dollars for a trip to Sheikh Hussein border terminal, where my rental car was parked on the Israeli side. The price was outrageous according to the local standards, but not so bad according to western standards — for a 350 km ride in a private taxi.
We were able to drive a kilometer or two only from the hostel, and then we had to stop at a road block, waiting for the road to Amman to be opened. We and other taxis packed with western tourists had to wait for more than an hour behind this road block, until the policemen finally opened the road at 10 o’clock. There would have been plenty of time and a good reason to sing “...may all your ChristMases be white”, but I doubt that anyone did so in their full-packed taxis.
Our spirits were greatly raised when the road block was finally opened, but work on the road was not ready yet. |
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