Trip Report: Jordan Trip 2019, Bulletin 3 by Todd Swain

Our last bulletin was written in a hotel room in rainy and snowy Wadi Musa. Once the weather cleared, we went to nearby Petra, Little Petra and did a beautiful drive north from Petra to a Neolithic village site. The walking approach to Petra via the siq (slot canyon) is as impressive as any of the narrow canyons in Zion National Park in Utah. Generally 20-40 feet wide and hundreds of feet deep, it makes for a very awe-inspiring approach to the carved stone facades of Petra. Petra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is of course immensely popular, but despite the hordes of people, it’s still amazing and should be on everyone’s life list. The carved stone facades are mind-blowing when you think that they were done without power tools (imagine Mount Rushmore times 100, being done solely with stone and iron tools). Wow.

From Petra, we returned to Wadi Rum for six more days. We stayed five more nights out in Khaled’s desert camp and established three new routes on the wall directly above his camp. The routes went up this wonderful, varnished wall that looked like Swiss cheese. We spent over three weeks at Wadi Rum and could easily have spent three more.

We left Wadi Rum in a rainstorm (our timing was perfect) and headed north to the Dead Sea. In addition to bobbing in the sea, Donette smearing mud all over herself and being pampered by hotel staff, we also went climbing on a very fun limestone slab not far above the Dead Sea (but still well below sea level; the Dead Sea is about 1,440 feet below sea level [Badwater in Death Valley is 266 feet]). While there, we ran into a group of “youth at risk” that were being taken rock climbing as part of their intervention program. We talked at length with the Jordanian climbing guides about the program and that Donette had done the same work for Outward Bound.

Above: Donette rappelling down the wall by Khaled’s camp where we did three new routes.

Above: One of Jordanian teenagers giving Donette a drink and cookie at the Dead Sea slab.

From the Dead Sea, we headed a bit north to another World Heritage Site, the location of Christ’s baptism by the River Jordan. The site was quite interesting, in that the river is only about 25 yards wide and on the west bank (in Israel), it’s highly developed. On the Jordanian side, signs are posted prohibiting anyone from going in or near the water; on the Israeli side, lots of folks were in the water being baptized or re-baptized.

From the baptism site, we drove north up the Jordan River Valley, which became more and more verdant. We ended the day in Jerash, the site of an ancient Roman city that we toured the next day. Not too long ago, archaeologists at Jerash discovered what is the oldest known machine in the world – a water powered stone saw. The machine was built circa 550AD. As we were going to dinner in Jerash that first evening, we were stopped on the sidewalk by two Jordanian men, who very much wanted us to know that they were Muslims and good people. They emphasized that bad actors like members of ISIS were the tiny minority of Muslims and that they (and Jordan) loved America. This interaction was typical of our encounters in Jordan. Local residents would ask where we were from, say “Welcome to Jordan” and make some comment about liking America. This, despite the hardships they have endured from the wars in adjacent Iraq and Syria.

After Jerash, we continued to the very northwest corner of Jordan to another archaeological site, Umm Qays. The drive was beautiful – trees, hills covered in grass and copious wildflowers; so much so, that you could easily think you were in northern Italy or the Central Coast of California in spring. We really liked Umm Qays – it was a cool mash-up of Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman architecture where each successive group re-utilized building materials from the previous occupants. From the hilltop site, we had wonderful views of the Golan Heights and the Sea of Galilee. Both were a short distance away.

To get to our lodging for the night, we drove along the border with Jordan, Syria and Israel, passing through four military checkpoints and one police checkpoint. Everyone was friendly and our basic Arabic phrases of “hello” and “thank you” brought smiles to all the men manning the posts.

We had planned to climb at a few cliffs in northern Jordan with some local climbers, but the weather was rainy, so we headed back south to the Dead Sea for our last days in the field. On our previous trip to the Dead Sea slabs, we spied a great looking crack right off the road. One of the guides with the youth at risk group had told us the crack was unclimbed and encouraged us to go do it.

On the 30th, we went to the crack. I was about 2/3 of the way up when the police and a couple men from a nearby adventure center showed up. An adventure center guy told us it was illegal to climb on the cliff because of hiking fatalities that had occurred in the area in the past.