Toronto, Canada

We arrived back in Toronto safely.  We ended up carrying most of our souvenirs as carry-on, which turned out to be much better for fragile souvenirs.  We had bought a cheap duffle bag intending to pack it carefully and check it; but then found out it was $70 to check a 2nd bag.  So the airplane people suggested we take it carry-on.  I think we'll try to do this for future trips!

Overall Jordan was a very enjoyable trip.  There weren't any safety issues, even near the borders.  The biggest impression was the lack of hard-sell from would-be guides, vendors, etc -- all it took was a single "no thanks" and they would wish us a good time in Jordan.  It was very refreshing.

Petra was amazing, it's in my top five places to see in the world.

There were a lot of ruins in Jordan, and we did get out-ruined after a while.  Three weeks in Jordan was probably too much time -- normally, Jordan would be part of a trip including Israel, Syria and/or Egypt, which would provide more variety.

Also, there's not much tourist infrastructure. Outside of Petra, Aqaba, Madaba and Amman there is very little mid-range accommodation.  Out of 22 days in Jordan, we spent 18 nights in those four cities.  I would have preferred a little more variety, but there just weren't places to stay.

Here's our pics from the trip:

2012 Jordan - favourites

Amman, Jordan

We've spent the last couple days of our trip in Amman. There's not that much tourist stuff to see here.

Did the walking tour from the Lonely Planet, which took about two hours. Took a taxi to the top of the Citadel (the Roman ruins at the top of a hill overlooking Amman). It was okay, not as impressive because we were at Jerash the day before. There's good views of the Roman Theatre along the walking tour, so we didn't bother to go inside.

Wandered through the fruit and vegetable souq and some other markets.

Had lunch at Hashem Restaurant, a local legendary falafel place. It was okay, and I suppose you have to eat there once if you visit Amman. There were more locals than tourists.

Had dessert (kunafa) at a little place in an alley with a huge lineup. It was excellent, a honey cake on top of cream cheese smothered in a sweet sauce, sprinkled with crushed pistacios.

We had plans for 6pm to meet a friend of Brendan's (Mohammad) who now lives in Amman, so we got home and cleaned up.

Mohammad met us at our hotel, and we drove out to Rainbow St, a trendy street with lots of cafés and restaurants and galleries.

Mohammed grew up in the area, and actually wrote a book Old Houses of Amman, based on the history of the houses on and around Rainbow St. He gave us a walking tour (much better than the Lonely Planet), and then we had some tea at one of the cafés and chatted away. It was cool to get a local's view, it's otherwise a bit risky to talk about some subjects like politics with strangers while traveling.

The next day was Friday, so we planned the day around things that were open on Fridays (lots is closed). Unfortunately even though the hours said it should be open, the National Gallery of Fine Arts was closed. So we walked up to Rainbow St, had an excellent lunch at La Calle (an Italian place), and Turkish coffees at another place.

We returned to the area for dinner at Cantaloupe, a new restaurant on the 4th floor of some building. The appetizers were pretty interesting, we shared cantaloupe and feta cheese with pesto, and bresaola with roca leaves (tastes a bit like arugula). Bresaola is cured beef, there's no pork served anywhere in Jordan.

Today we had plans to visit the Art Gallery again, except it rained for the first time on our trip. Before the rain, we did get to Darat al-Funun, a privately funded art gallery. It took a bit of searching for the place. We ran into some other tourists walking around lost with guide book in hand who were also looking for the place, the Lonely Planet maps are terrible.

(The Lonely Planets have been getting progressively worse since they were bought by the BBC. The best thing I could say about the Jordan edition is that it had some blank pages for notes. We only bought it because the Rough Guide's updated edition for Jordan was published two days after we left Canada).

We're now back at the hotel, catching up on reading. Our flight is at 5am (all Europe departures are around this time) so we have a taxi arranged for 2am. It's sort of a waste of a hotel room, but really the only option.

Jerash, Jordan

Another day, another set of Roman ruins. Our hotel (Hadrian's Gate) is right outside the entrance to the old walled roman city. It was easy enough to walk down to the ticket booth (through a maze of souvenir stalls), buy our tickets and start our visit of Jerash.

We walked through Hadrian's Arch, a 13m tall entrance to the city. It was enormous. Over the next three hours we wandered through the site. The highlights included the Temple of Zeus, the Forum, the South Theatre, Temple of Artemis, and Cardo Maximus. There has been a lot of restoration work here -- there are some before and after pics that show a pile of rubble, and then the current state. It's by far the best set of Roman ruins I've seen.

Fortunately it's December, because it was about 15C and sunny. I couldn't imagine doing all this in 35C in the summer.

Had lunch at a roadside grill place, and then caught a taxi to our hotel in Amman, the final leg of our trip. We're staying at the Crystal Hotel in the business district.

Jordan Valley, Jordan

We were up at 6:30am for a big road trip. Had breakfast, packed, checked out. Our driver met us at our hotel. Or so we thought. After getting our bags in the trunk and starting off, we realized with the driver that we weren't his passengers -- it was another couple who we going to Petra! So we apologized, found our real driver, and switched our stuff over to his car.

Today were the sights in Jordan Valley. We started at almost Dead Sea level. Heather was just getting into my cold, so now both of us had trouble equalizing with the altitude changes.

First stop was Pella, about two hours north from Madaba, through winding roads. Pella is supposedly the most historically significant site in Jordan, because it's been continuously settled for 7000 years. The ruins lie a scattered amongst farmers fields. At one point we saw a shepherd take a flock of sheep through the ruins site.

In a single view, we saw ruins from the Ummayads (760 AD), Romans (60 BC), Mamluks (1300 AD), Byzantine era (400 AD), and Canaanites (1270 BC).

Next was Umm Qais, in the northwest corner of Jordan. Umm Qais was one of the Decapolis cities of the Roman Empire in the 1st century AD. The Lonely Planet says Umm Qais is striking because of the juxtaposition of roman and Ottoman-era ruins, but after Petra with Roman and Nabataean ruins, the Ottoman stuff seems pretty plain.

What is cool about Umm Qais is its location on a hilltop in the corner of Jordan. From a viewpoint (and if it's not hazy like today) you can see Syria, Lebanon, the Golan Heights, and the Sea of Galilee.

The roman ruins are also cool, not yet restored, but pale in comparison to Jerash.

Last for the day was Ajloun Castle. This has been mostly restored, and is fun to wander around and explore all its rooms and levels.

We drove to Jerash to end our day. Checked in at the Hadrian Gate Hotel, and had dinner at the Lebanese House. Supposedly the Lebanese House is pretty famous (the menu has a page full of dignitaries that have eaten there). It was pretty good, but I wouldn't go out of my way to go there.