Visiting Petra

After a few weeks of procrastination (and late nights at work), it is time for some posts from my Jordan visit. This first post is about the highlight of the entire trip and it happened the first day. On our inbound travel day, we arrived in Aqaba, Jordan around 8:00 am. The downside is to get there that early, the travel process started in the very early morning. The bonus was that with no planned conference events that day, we had a golden opportunity to knock out a little sightseeing (after a quick stop at McDonald's).

A group of four of us hired a car and driver to take us out to see Petra. It took us about one-and-a-half hours to wind our way inland and up into the mountains. Petra is one of the World Heritage sites and some also place it as one of the new 7 wonders of the world. It is an archaelogical site in southern Jordan renowned for its rock-cut architecture. The Nabateans constructed it as their capital city around 100 BCE and portions of it are amazingly preserved to this day. If you've seen "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade", then you are familiar with part of Petra which played the role of the Templar Knights' tomb and final resting place of the Holy Grail.

Heading down into the valley to the site, you walk through a dark and narrow gorge called the Siq ("the shaft") that is naturally cut through the sandstone rocks. As you come to the end of the narrow gorge, Petra's most well-preserved ruin, Al Khazneh (popularly known as "the Treasury") peeks through the gap between the walls of the gorge. This is the amazing view familiar from "Indiana Jones" (first picture on left). It was incredible.

There are hundreds of caves/tombs/temples/buildings throughout the "city" of Petra as you wind down the gorge. Each of them has multiple chambers cut into the rock, some with additional tombs built inside and underneath the larger ones. All through the gorge are also the remains of stone-carved stairways cut into the beautifully colored, striped sandstone - paths to access the higher places. There is even a full amphitheater with multiple tiers of seating, tunnel entrances, and a stage.

We did a ton of climbing and exploring in four hours, but you could easily spend days here and not see everything. This site is easily one of the most amazing things I have ever seen, definitely worth a return visit. I have merely brushed the surface of all that is here, so please check out the web-link above to learn more.