The Lowest Place on Earth

Jordan  •  Dead Sea, Shobak Castle & Mount Nebo  •  March 2006

Our last full day in Jordan, and we weren't about to spend it resting. We'd already done Petra, one long, very full day covered everything, even with our two-hour mountain hike, and had the whole day free before Petra by Night that evening. We popped into a travel agency the night before and arranged a car to the Dead Sea for $65. Our driver picked us up at 7:30am and his name was Ferris.

Ferris was not entirely pleased that all we'd seen of Jordan was Petra and the King's Highway, which is essentially a desert freeway clogged with oil trucks. He asked if he could take us the longer way and show us some things. Of course we said yes.

First stop was Shobak Castle, more than 1,300 years old, sitting out in the landscape with this quiet, ancient confidence. From there Ferris took us on a scenic route that revealed something I genuinely hadn't expected: Jordan is not just desert. There's a canyon that honestly reminded us of the Grand Canyon. Rolling green hills. Completely different landscapes bleeding into each other. If you only take the highway between Petra and Amman you miss all of this. Jordan is much more beautiful and varied than its reputation suggests.

We arrived at the Dead Sea mid-afternoon having made no plan to swim, which meant no swimsuits. Fortunately, there are vendor stalls right near the beach. Unfortunately, every single swimsuit available appeared to have been designed in 1987 featuring colors that should not exist on fabric. I eventually found one vendor with a one-piece for 7 Jordanian dinars and that was that. Wearing a swimsuit when you've already been stared at for days as a white woman in Egypt and Jordan is a whole different level of being stared at. I just want to acknowledge that out loud.

But the Dead Sea. It's 30% salt. Nothing lives in it. It's the lowest place on earth at 1,300 feet below sea level. And the floating is unlike anything I've ever experienced. We'd heard about it. We were not prepared. You literally cannot sink. Getting your feet back to the ground to stand up is an actual physical challenge because you just keep bobbing back up like a cork. We did what everyone does and grabbed handfuls of that mineral-rich mud from the bottom and slathered it all over ourselves. There's a gift shop on site selling it in bags for $10. You're standing in the free version. It's a funny world.

I kept my hair dry. Matt, less successfully, emerged from the water and got saltier by the hour as his hair dried. Salt appearing on his face, his neck, his ears. Every time we wiped it off, more salt appeared from somewhere new. Endlessly salted. Highly entertaining from where I was sitting.

We had four military checkpoints on the drive. Israel is right across the water, less than 20 miles away, and Jordan takes this seriously. Four soldiers in full gear, Hummers with mounted machine guns. Each stop, the soldiers seemed genuinely pleased we were American. One wanted to see our passports almost as if to double-check our driver wasn't making it up. Jordan hadn't felt particularly intense up to this point. This was a reminder of exactly where we were.

We finished the day at Mount Nebo, which is where the Bible says Moses climbed to see the Holy Land before he died. There's a monument and a beautiful church with mosaic floors. I stood there looking out toward what would be Israel in the distance and tried to feel the weight of that history. It's everywhere in this part of the world, unavoidable in the best way.

That evening we had Petra by Night. And then we flew home.

Walking away from this trip, if there's one thing I want anyone reading this to take away: don't be afraid of this part of the world. What you find is a country that is cleaner and calmer than you expect, and people who are SO genuinely excited to see Americans and tell you so. "Americans in Jordan is very good!" We heard that constantly. What you find is Ferris, who went out of his way to show us the Jordan that tourists don't see because he was proud of it. You find connection. You find history that makes your own life feel like a footnote in the very best way.

Indiana Jones Had It Right

Jordan  •  Petra  •  March 2006  

There are places you've imagined your whole life. And then there are places that, when you finally arrive, are somehow better. Petra is one of those places.

You instantly feel like a kid again. A kid who wants to be an explorer. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade didn't help with this, it's where the Holy Grail scene was filmed…and I will tell you honestly that we walked through Petra with a small part of our brains genuinely expecting to find a room with invisible steps and a Crusader. We did not find that room. We found something better.

We started at 7am, making our way down the As-Siq: the one-kilometer corridor that winds through a narrow gorge carved by water over centuries. In places it's barely wide enough for two people side by side. The walls tower above you in red and orange layered rock. It looks like Zion National Park decided to go somewhere even more dramatic. We'd seen pictures. Completely irrelevant. Nothing you see in a photo prepares you for the moment you round that last corner and the Treasury appears through the crack in the rock. Just peeking out at first. Then more of it. Then all of it.

Absolutely beautiful. In that quiet, slightly unreal way where you stop walking and just stand there.

Fair warning though: the inside of the Treasury is one room and three smaller rooms. There is no deep chasm. There is no Holy Grail. There is no Crusader. I was fine with this.

Walking away from the Treasury you start noticing the dwellings carved into the cliff faces on either side — this Southwestern US look in the design that makes you want to poke your head into every single one. Then the theater, carved directly from the rock, built to hold 7,000 people, the bleacher-style seating still visible.

We found a small trail leading upward. We followed it. The stairs kept coming. We stopped for a snack halfway up and assessed the situation. We had already come this far. Would Indiana Jones have stopped? Hell no. One hour of hiking later we were standing at the top of the mountain looking DOWN at the entire city of Petra spread out below us. I am still proud of that. Look at the photos from the ground and you'll understand just how far "way the heck up there" actually is.

We had a surprisingly excellent lunch at the restaurant inside the park: saffron rice with lamb, the best falafel of the whole trip, hummus, tabbouleh, pita. Simple and wonderful in the way that food after a significant hike always is.

For the Monastery, 800-plus steps, we hired donkeys. This sounds more relaxing than it is. It's mostly an upper body workout trying to hold on as your donkey launches himself down broken stairs at a speed he finds completely appropriate and you absolutely do not. My donkey in particular liked to go fast and seemed genuinely interested in how far he could launch me. The Monastery was worth every second of the donkey drama: as breathtaking as the Treasury, much larger, with a small café where you can sit and just look at it.

We were tired and covered in Petra dust heading back. The bath that evening was the best bath I have ever taken in my entire life.

The next day we took a day trip to the Dead Sea, more on that in its own post, and then that final evening, Petra by Night.

Petra by Night happens only three nights a week. We were lucky enough to have one of those nights fall on our last night in Jordan. They take 1,500 candles and line the entire As-Siq and the Treasury with them. You walk down in complete silence. The sky was clear and full of stars. The rock walls glowed warm orange in the candlelight. Every so often you'd catch the smell of the wax.

When you reach the Treasury you sit on mats on the ground. Bedouin musicians play traditional music: first a stringed instrument that's a flat rectangle of goat skin with a single string. And then, from somewhere inside the dark Treasury, flute music starts playing. A musician appears in the entrance and walks through the candlelight to stand before you. They serve you tea.

I cannot adequately describe this experience. I can just say: seeing Petra lit by candlelight at night is a completely different experience from seeing it during the day, and both are absolutely necessary.

This trip left us with a lot to process. So much history, so much that is ancient and beyond comprehension in its scale. We walked away from Egypt and Jordan genuinely moved in a way we hadn't quite anticipated. We'd seen poverty that most Americans truly can't comprehend, and people extending hospitality anyway. We'd touched things 3,500 years old. We'd floated in a sea that doesn't support life. And we'd ended with 1,500 candles lighting our way through a lost city in the dark.

If you've been thinking about going to Egypt or Jordan and talking yourself out of it: go. It's not for the faint-hearted traveler, especially if you go independently. But walking the streets instead of being bussed from sight to sight means you get the real version of these places. You get Fahti. You get the restaurant owner asking you to write a love letter. Those are the things you don't forget.