I just got back from a weekend excursion to Petra and Wadi Rum. If you've never heard of Petra before, I'm sure you've at least seen a picture of it before. Indiana Jones and the last Crusad was filmed there and so were a couple other movies which I can't think of at the moment. But it's a 2000 year old city which was carved out of the sand stone. Our tour guide Daud was a nice guy withg a lot of information who had visited the place a couple hundered times. He talked us into taking a hike up to what is called the "high place". The trail is 4000 stairs carved out of the mountain. It was shoking to see how many people in my group are out of shape. For some it was their first time hiking. But the view was amazing. On top the call to prayer came over the mountains from the modern city of Petra. My new friend Duff from Ft. Lauderdale is training to become an Islamic Scholar. Upon hearing the call he stood up on a rock and started reciting the call. I will never forget it.

We ate lunch in a resaurant that was 8 dinars (which is a rip off) for the buffet which was food that had been made the other day and left in metal trays. To leave Petra you have to go all the way back the way you came through a canyon called the Siq which was carved by water from flash floods. Are Hotel was on top of a surrounding mountain and looked out over Petra. Besides the fact that dinner gave me and a few other people food poisoniong, it was a really nice hotel. Though I have never had to walk through metal ditectors to get into a hotel before.

The next morning we went to Wadi Rum which is a very famous desert where lawrence of Arabia spent some of his time. Wadi Rum is beautiful with different rock formations and various clorous of sand. To get out into the desert we got in the back of jeeps (they called them jeeps but they were really toyota's)and rode out. The drivers were Bedouin and kept trying to talk the tour guide into paying them more money. To start the "jeep" the driver would hotwire the engine. It was quite an experince.

And of course here are pictures: