Land of the Nabateans

The road to Wadi Musa is hilly, rolling up and down as it winds through town after town. After a brief stop in Shobak, home to a crusader castle where the insane and cruel Raynald of Châtillon would force his captives to jump a 450 m cliff to their death, Chris and I found ourselves still 30 km away when the sun disappeared.

We decided to hitch with a passing truck, but found it incredibly difficult because the drivers all wanted to charge more money than even a private taxi. What happened to the kindness of strangers? Clearly the atmosphere of Petra's tourism and walking-cash-machine foreigner mentality has seeped into their hearts. Not only would Wadi Musa prove to be difficult, the sheer bombardment of people wanting to sell something, find us a hotel, guide us to a restaurant, etc., left a bad taste in my mouth. We tried to ignore all of the overpriced foreign catches (except the hefty entrance fee of 60 dinar/ $90 that we couldn't sidestep!) but still were forced to buy food at heavily inflated prices. People aren't even shy about saying locals pay one price and foreigners are charged well up to 10 times more. One shwarma restaurant cashier explained to Chris he must triple charge him because it's a government law!

Break time in Wadi Musa

We stayed outside of town in Amarin village, with a couchsurfer host and his Bedouin family, as well as their long term Czech guest and two Australian girls. Our host, Khaled, comes from a family that has lived for centuries in the nearby Nabatean caves of Wadi Baird (Cold Canyon); however, some years ago the government built a small village nearby and relocated the people into homes on the promise of free housing, electricity, and running water.

Tea with Khaled and his cousin in Khaled's house

Chris and I hitched back to Wadi Musa (the once daily morning bus is for school kids only) and spent too much time wandering the steep street shops in search of picnic provisions. There are few if any produce supplies, with disgustingly rotten options, though a wealth of packaged junk foods from all over the world. Even Burger King fries and onions rings! Eventually we made a friend at a restaurant who sold us fresh hummus to go with our pide bread and green pomello.

Bedouins atop the Palace Tombs of Petra

Once inside the archaeological park we followed a stampede of tourists down a long rock path, past an army of bedouins renting out donkey and carriage rides. Almost immediately we came upon several large djinn blocks (spirit houses), enormous cubed rocks where the Nabateans believed they could sequester the spirits wandering about the desert.

One of the larger Djinn Blocks entering Petra

Most of the cubes have temple facades carved into one side; later "god blocks" are small niches carved into the canyon walls.

My favorite djinn block, inside the siq

Nabateans were the bedouin tribes that came to Petra from western Arabia over 2500 years ago. As a society they carved temples and tombs, tricliniums (feasting halls) and cisterns into the valley's sandstone canyon. Almost all of the facades are Hellenistic (and later Assyrian) in influence, with ornately decorated Corinthian pillars, but usually bare inside. They were able to pay off the Romans for a few centuries, though finally in the 1st century AD they finally lost their autonomy and Petra was reconstructed under Roman rule.

Camels have been walking here for 2600 years!

Colorful sandstone walls ornate the Nabatean tombs

The first and more exciting path into the canyon is the siq, a winding ribbon passing between crust that has shifted apart, sometimes only 2 m wide, with a slit of sky 40 m above.

Petra's siq

Narrow siq opens up to the Treasury

Camel caravan engravings in the siq (leaders feet remain)

There are no moments of solitude in Petra. Hundreds of thousands of visitors each year cram into the park, along with hundreds of bedouins and their pack animals, carting tourists around for a few dinar. A nearly constant stream of carriages bellows down the siq, transporting people to the treasury; from there are camel rides through the Street of Facades and Grand Palace; then donkey rides up to the monastery. All the while bedouin men are hawking their animals as Lamborghinis or Ferrari rides, kids try to sell postcards "cheap as chips they ahhr!", and women sit with displays of real and fake jewelry stalls "only looking cheap gift!". If the ticket price didn't burn a whole in one's pocket the entertainment inside will...

Charging chariots inside the siq

Camels near the Street of Facades

The coolest and most ingenious aspect of the Nabatean city is actually the water channel system. Horizontally along the siq is a cut channel system that caught rainwater (diverting it from flooding the siq street) and carried it down to the large cisterns carved into the rocks. From there the water was filtered into gardens that covered huge terraces around the temples. Most of the sandstone carved facades -which are all now barren and lifeless -were for a long time green and covered with gardens. The entire city flourished from this engineered water system, sustaining life, growing local foods, and holding down the dust that swirls about in sudden tornadoes.

Rock cut water channels through the siq

Water channel for garden storage in Little Petra

Of course the most famous scene is when the siq opens up to the megalith carved treasury façade, named thus because of a Bedouin tale that an Egyptian king once hid his treasure here. Made famous by Indiana Jones, this spot is a popular place for photos on a camel, etc.

In front of The Treasury

Then road then leads to an open area, deemed the Street of Facades, Assyrian in design with stepped triangles, because of the many carved temple doorways that lead nowhere. There are also hundreds of caves surrounding where later bedouin tribes squatted for centuries.

Caves near the Street of Facades

Next is the Roman street: a chariot worthy road lined by houses, an agora (markets), and the Grand Palace, almost all of which is completely in ruins today.

Bedouin merchant along the Roman street

Palace Tombs from the Grand Temple

The second day Chris and I arrived very early, hoping to glimpse the Treasury in full light. Unfortunately the winter sun never reaches above the canyon walls so as we waited for a bit of orange to move across the upper statues it just as quickly disappeared. So we decided to go hiking on some of the alternative routes described in our book.

Musician near Petra's siq

Most of the entrances have been blocked off so we walked all the way out of the siq to a longer trail, though as we stepped away the tourist police stopped us, forbidding us to walk the trail unless we pay 20 JD ($28) for a guide to escort us. Annoyed but not surprised, we declined and instead hightailed it through the park toward the monastery.

Bedouin Lamburginis

Up up up we climbed the footworn stone stairs, high above the wadi's ruins onto the windy mountaintop. The stairs finally open to a flat basin. Unlike the Treasury, the Monastery facade does not reveal itself from the street, but rather surprises one who turns around.

The Monastery facade hidden in the cliffs


At the Monastery

Opposite the facade is a cafe where tourists sit to sip lemon mint soda and tea while admiring the view. Chris and I climbed up to a strangely eroded boulder and ate our picnic lunch, resting from the hike, before hiking further to a lookout peak at The End Of The World View. From this cliff it is possible to see endless elephantitis-like blooms of sandstone rolling out in all directions; to the west a sudden flat basin of the Holy Land.


View from The End of The World

We also spent a day exploring Wadi Baird (Cold Canyon), which is also called little Petra. The siq here is much shorter, leading to a few largely ignored temple facades and baetyls (spirit blocks), then up to a wider wadi surrounded by climbable boulder cliffs. Our host Khaled, hangs out here most days, drinking tea with his cousin and playing his flute, which echoes through the canyon.

Sandstone staircases in Wadi Baird

Nabatean tombs in Little Petra (Wadi Baird)

Khaled's wadi and tea stop

Hiking Wadi Baird makes me sleepy

Late in the afternoon Chris and I joined Khaled and Muhammad for lunch: vegetables and lamb roasted over a campfire, with tea and a little hookah, before hiking down through the wadi. The river bed continues on for miles but we stopped after an hour and turned back, with just enough sun left to sit with some tourists before heading
back home.


Walking Wadi Baird (Cold Canyon)

Khaled cooks lunch over the fire

Bedouin lunch in Wadi Baird (Little Petra)

For Christmas we enjoyed a slightly strange ambiance inside Khaled's house. The building isn't really finished, more like a concrete cell that he squats in, and outrageously drafty. All night torrential wind blasts against his windows; I dreamt that I was scrambling around a kitchen with my brother, trying to locate one of thousands of cupboards that was continuously slamming open and closed, very Alice in Wonderland style. I woke and realized that in fact the window panes were being beaten by a severely howling wind, which would have been terrifying had I not been so tired.

One evening we spent with Khaled and his family in their house, watching the popular Turkish soap opera we always catch during home visits. Other nights we hung out with Khaled, Muhammad, and Carlos in the concrete prison, drinking strongly sugared tea and learning about Khaled's tribe. He even served us mansef, the ultimate standard of Jordanian fare: a large tray of rice cooked with chunks of bread, topped with a chopped, roasted goat, and drenched in yogurt.

Eating mansef with Khaled