Trip to Petra in May 2023

In May we traveled to Petra to see this amazing wonder of the world. I wouldn't call the trip amazing, however. There was too much stress for my liking.

First of all, we needed to leave the country and come back because our 3 month visa was set to expire at the end of June (with us staying in Israel until the end of July), and we had heard that international travel allows tourists to come back to Israel and have the three months reset. When you get to the end of this post, you will hear how that turned out for us.

Now, back to the trip. We had heard the most impressive things about seeing Petra. People raved about the sites and how wonderful their experiences were. So, Mark found a lovely 2 day, one night excursion from Jerusalem for us through a travel company. We were scheduled to leave Jerusalem from the David Citadel hotel very early in the morning on a Tuesday morning, spend the day touring around Jordan, sleep at a hotel (not a tent) in Petra, and see Petra on Wednesday with a late afternoon trip back to Jerusalem.

We arrived early for our 6:30 am pick up and saw other tourists there, mostly Americans but also some other English speaking visitors to Israel. Each of them were taking either a three day tour or a four day tour with the same travel company we used. We were a little worried that we were not in the right place when no one else was doing the two day tour, but we jumped into the transportation provided anyway. Most of the people fit into the van, but Mark and I and one other couple (Robin and Bernie from Australia) were placed in a taxi that followed the van. We drove about an hour or two to the Allenby border crossing (north of Jerusalem) where things were pretty confusing. On the Israel side, we paid for the visa to Jordan, went through passport control, and then had to wait for a bus to take us across the border. The first bus was full so we had to wait "ten minutes" which was actually closer to 30 minutes for the next one. We paid $2 for each of us for the bus (we actually paid $5 instead of $4 because we didn't have exact change), and then we got to the Jordan side where we were met by our tour guide. At this point we finally knew we were in the right place because he had a list of everyone who was doing each tour. That took a load off our anxious minds. 

Because we were only staying one night, we had to pay an additional visa fee in Jordan. As the only couple on the two day excursion, we were the only ones who had to do this. We waited quite a while behind another group at the special visa window but once it was our turn, it went very quickly. Finally, the rest of the tourists joined us inside the building, and we all went through passport control. This part went much more smoothly than I expected. We had our irises scanned as a security measure. We then walked outside and had our luggage scanned. Then we got on the bus where they once again checked our passport stamps. The whole procedure was very long, and it was very hot out while we were waiting for things. Finally we got on the bus and were on our way.

The first stop was Jerrash where we saw extensive historical ruins. On the way there we had a quick stop for lunch where our choices were falafel or schwarma. I wanted the schwarma but forgot that it wouldn't be kosher, so I switched to falafel. There were two wraps in each package so Mark and I shared one package and saved the other package for later which I was very grateful to have done. During the bus ride, we were lucky to have wifi and USB charge ports under the seats. The driver's name was Itar.

In Jerash, the tour guide walked us around the ruins for about 2 hours. It was very hot, and he warned us that there were people who would "help" us take a nice picture and then try to charge us money for their help, so we just said "no thank you." After the long tour of Jerash, and the extra time in the Jordan border crossing, we did not have time to stop at Mount Nebo where Moses is said to have looked out over the Promised Land. That was disappointing. During our time on the bus, our guide, Khalid, spoke a lot about history. However, he never once said the word Israel. He only called it Canaan. That was disappointing and made us a bit uncomfortable. However, we were very grateful for his assistance at the border crossing and for the extensive information he shared about Jerash. 

view from the bus

snacks in Jerash

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We had another long bus ride to Amman to drop off the other tourists, most of whom were at the 3 star hotel, and one of whom chose the 4 star hotel. I had the pleasure of going to the restroom there, and boy was it gorgeous and fancy! The air conditioning felt great in there too. At this point, we were given a driver named Ahmad to take us to Petra. After a 3 hour drive, we were finally at our hotel. Luckily, the dining room was still open so we could grab some food. On the way there we stopped at a huge store for snacks and a bathroom break. The whole day was very long and very hot with a lot of stress and uncomfortable moments. The 3 star Oscar hotel worked out well for us. Dinner and breakfast were included, but we had to pay for our drinks. I did not enjoy the hard bed, but the room was spacious and comfortable otherwise. 

On Wednesday, we had an adequate breakfast at the hotel, checked out, and went to Petra itself. A driver came to the hotel to pick us up, and first stop allowed us to drop off our bags at the travel company's office. The backpacks waited for us there all day. The driver then brought us about 5 or 6 blocks down the road to the entrance of Petra. Our private tour guide's name was Shadeez. I very much appreciated the morning's cool breeze. Shadeez was very knowledgeable and guided us through the first 2 hours of our walk through Petra. At one point he asked, "how long have you been dreaming of seeing Petra?" and my answer was "no time?" It had not been a big dream of mine the way it has been for other people. Anyway, the structures were HUGE, beautiful, and very decorative, and it is obvious that there is still much excavation to be done to find even more parts of the beautiful ancient city. At one point during our long walks, Shadeez asked us if we were "real Americans," which meant he was wondering if we were Jewish. Very uncomfortable. Of course we said "yes, we are real Americans," but he seemed unconvinced. At the deepest part of the tour, Shadeez said goodbye to us. Mark took an additional hike up a mountain to a monastery, but I stayed at the outdoor areas of the restaurants at the base. It was a very hot and long walk back to the Visitor's Center and Museum. When we got there, I sat on the floor for about a half hour to recover in the air conditioning. During our walk back, there were about 400 rockets fired toward Israel from the Gaza Strip. We kept receiving Red Alert after Red Alert. Very scary. And we were worried about getting back into Israel from Jordan.

    

        

         

After seeing the museum, we returned to the touring company's office at the appointed time and waited there for our bus to the border. We did not purchase any souvenirs in Petra even though there were many stands all along the way. There was one last lunch in Petra that was included, but it didn't happen until 3 pm! The bus drove us to the Eilat border crossing (south). Leaving Jordan we were told we would need to pay again but that didn't happen. On the Israel side, it felt so good to leave Jordan behind, I breathed a huge sigh of relief. But when we tried to renew our visas, the border agent called over her supervisor. The supervisor proceeded to yell at us saying "do you know it's illegal to extend your visa a border crossing?" We said, "no, obviously we didn't know that" and agreed to make an appointment at the Misrad Hapanim to extend our visa for the extra month. Sadly, we couldn't even make an appointment to make an appointment, though we tried. Instead we took a flight to Cyprus and were able to renew our visas at a machine in the airport upon our return to Israel.

Our final leg was a very long bus ride to Jerusalem. We arrived at the David Citadel at 12:30 a.m. and walked home to our apartment, arriving around 1 a.m. It was an interesting and challenging trip. I hope you enjoy the photos.