December 2nd: Wadi Rum to Amman

For being in a tent in the middle of the desert, I slept surprisingly well. The blankets were nice and toasty and the bed was comfy, though we were woken a few times by blowing sand hitting the sides of the tent. At any rate, we wound up getting up just in time to watch the sun rise over the desert.

It was really neat to watch the colors change as the sun rose higher

After a little while it was time for breakfast. I wouldn't mind eating this every morning: pita with hummus, cucumbers and tomatoes with labneh, and coffee. Nom.

We enjoyed our breakfast view for a little while longer, then went back to our tent and finished packing our things. Staying at the camp had been fun, but we had more things to see!

We hopped into the back of the truck...

...and set off to explore Wadi Rum.

It didn't take long to get to our first stop. This was the view in the distance.

This really felt like Mars. The picture barely does it justice.

The highlight of the first stop, though, was a spring! It was hidden in a crack in the rocks. Ahmad made sure we all got a chance to check it out, and explained some ways that you could tell where water was hiding in the desert.

This was the view looking in the other direction. Crazy.

Ahmad talked a little bit more about living in the desert...

...while I took a billion pictures of the scenery.

We eventually walked back down to the truck and started toward our next stop.

Every once in a while we'd pass a camel as we drove along.

Sometimes, we'd pass another truck, too. (Honestly, I'm surprised these pictures turned out as well as they did, considering how much we were bouncing around in the back!)

A few minutes later we made it to our next stop, and Ahmad led us back into the canyon to show us...

...some cave drawings! It was crazy; they were just right there, all over the rocks.

We checked them out for a few minutes...

...then made our way back out and continued on to the next stop.

The next stop was a cool rock formation that you could climb all over.

The view was pretty cool from the top (though really, ALL of the views from pretty much everywhere were great).

We were definitely not the only people riding through the desert that morning! Nothing felt overly crowded, though.

Our last stop was a huuuuuge sand dune that you could climb. This picture doesn't really do justice to how big it was, and we were only about halfway up.

We eventually came back down to the truck and started making our way back to our car. Wadi Rum was one of the coolest places I've been; I'm so glad we got to visit.   :)

We made it back to our car, said goodbye to our truck driver, and Ahmad started the loooong drive north.

We passed through Aqaba along the way. There were more police checkpoints here, and we got stopped a couple times.

We at least made one voluntary stop: for some tasty shawarma to eat along the way.

We drove for hours, paralleling the Jordan/Israel border for a while. It was kind of crazy to see Israel just on the other side of a fence.

A few hours later, we reached our last stop of the trip: the Dead Sea! Ahmad stopped at an overlook so we could check it out from above, then drove us a short distance to the Golden East hotel. We ducked into the locker rooms to change into our bathing suits...

...then walked down to the beach for a swim.

When they say that you can easily float in the Dead Sea, they aren't kidding! You're so buoyant that your legs rise up to the top, and you can't swim if you try. (And we watched a guy try; it was hilarious. He got into the water and tried to swim a few strokes and instead wound up almost drowning himself as his legs popped up to the top and pitched his face into the water. Don't worry, he was fine.) And yes, it's VERY salty - almost chemically so. Because of course I tasted it. It was disgusting.

We floated around for a bit, took advantage of the mud mask things you could get off to the side, and hung out for a bit, enjoying the view.

After a little while it was time to clean up and meet Ahmad, so we grabbed a few last pictures, then made our way to the locker rooms to get changed and head out.

The drive back to Amman took a while; we did make a couple quick stops along the way, but most of it was winding mountain roads. It didn't take long for me to start feeling pretty rough, so I spent a good part of the ride trying to doze in the back of the car, and fantasizing about how nice it would be when I was not in a moving vehicle again.

We eventually reached the airport hotel in Amman, and said thank you and goodbye to Ahmad. He had been a fantastic driver, and we couldn't have asked for a nicer person to spend a few days exploring Jordan with. I'm so glad we got to meet him!

I felt pretty rough by the time we got to the hotel. Not only was I a bit carsick, but over the past day or so I had started to pick up a lot of chest congestion. I thought it might have been from all the fires and smoke we passed as we wandered through Petra and hung out at the Bedouin camp in Wadi Rum, but I wasn't sure. Either way, I felt a bit like death, so I spent a little while just sitting around like a slug when we got to the hotel.

My go-to 'I need to feel better' room service order: fries. And they did help a bit. After grabbing a shower and eating some fries, I spent a little time repacking before heading to bed. We had an early alarm the next day, and a little bit more trip left!