After 6 months in The Middle East we thought it would be good to give a glimpse of the stereotypes we've developed, totally on our very own, about each country. From the sublime to the ridiculous to the downright bloody stupid, for those of you that couldn't be bothered to read this site, those who looked at the pictures instead... this is our 'thought shower' on what been like for us daft wayward travellers out here in the desert...

EGYPT

- A major lack of visible women
- Amazing archaeology and history
- Bad food... but great falafel
- Cheap
- Inept authorities
- No public shows of affection allowed
- Constant demands for baksheesh
- A million scams
- Overcrowded in the cities
- Large poor underclass
- Men with wandering hands

JORDAN

- Peaceful mediator of the region
- Hard to navigate independently
- Proud and patriotic people
- Organised authorities
- Warm and generous bedouins
- Small, but with hidden gems

SYRIA

- Real arabic hospitality
_ Safe
- Friendliest, most genuine and generously amazing people
- Tasty local sweets
- More fat people
- Great hotels
- Vast country
- Rich history
- The best crusader castles

LEBANON

- Expensive
- Most westernised country in the area
- Religiously diverse and tollerant
- Hezbollah
- Very green
- Coastline... beaches
- Good food
- Vibrant
- Skinny, trendy people

ISRAEL

- Very old, very special.
- Expensive
- Great bagels
- Affluent and modern
- Clean
- Biblical.
- Unique.

To anyone who might be worried about us still being in Dahab, fortunately we left a few days ago and are in Jordan. We fly to Thailand today.

What an absolutely hilarious day. Sucessful and unsucessful hitch-hicking experiences, unwittingly staring in an Arabic home movie, eventually persuading my Mum that the Dead sea would hold her and enable her to float, covering ourselves in mud, and constantly praying for the rain to abait.

Jez and I had under-estimated the time it took to get to the particular bus station in Amman that took us to South Shoona, the drop off point that we would get the taxi from to Bethany. Thankfully a nice local, bemused that we were walking down a very busy road looking lost, offered to take us there. Very happy that we had accepted and even happier that he did'nt demand money when we reached our destination, we prepared ourseleves to be looked at for the next hour on the public bus. One bloke even went so far as to stop the bus when he saw us on it, jump aboard, scream "welcome welcome" far too loudly and then hop off again, leaving our fellow passengers gawping at eachother. ( And for those few seconds not us!)

Bethany, The Baptism Site of Jesus.

The highlight of Bethany is seeing the River Jordan where Jesus was baptised and the remains of the 3 churches that historians/ archiologists/ pilgrims use to justify the validity of this claim. Its a very quiet, spiritual place enhanced by the clever lansdcaping, religious commentary and views of The Holy Land in Palestine, Jericho and Jersualem. Its quite special to think that you are walking the same ground as Jesus and John The Baptist and that all those places you read about in the Bible were actually real and still are! You also get an airconditioned minibus thrown in with the five pound ticket price, just in case you were to consider wandering off the path and find yourself in Isreal by accident.

Jez and I learned from our mistakes and this time employed a taxi driver to wait the 1 and a half hours it took to see the site. No hitching for 3 hours this trip. He was ready and waiting on our return and zoomed us off to The Dead Sea. We had been rained upon in Bethany and decided that even if the heavens opened we would get into that Sea. Its not every day you get to float like that!

The lowest place on earth.

My Mum rarely goes further than paddling in the sea. Don't get me wrong, she can swim, but she just needs to be sure that there is something to hold onto near by. Seas don't generally have ladders and steps so they are usually out. However much I tried to tell her that the Dead Sea would naturally support her with ease, you can't quite believe it until you see it and feel it! We had come prepared with sea shoes to avoid the sharp salt crystals and slowly made our way in. I suggested just imagining the sea was a chair and slowly lowering ourselves into it. But, its just too hard to imagine that you won't sink. eventually Mum made the plunge and as quickly as she expected to sink, bobbed back up due to the salinity of the water. She could'nt stop laughing, so I could'nt stop laughing. Jez completley embarrased by the screaming English women was surely wishing he had not been asked to record the moment and could just pretend he was'nt with us.

It was all going great until mum decided she wanted to try and swim on her front. This is not an easy thing to do as the sea won't let you. You simply bob, your legs high in the air at one end, your face and neck in the air at the other, looking like a failed acrobat. Panicking, she grabbed me and accidentally pulled my bikini top down revealing one boob to everyone that was looking, which was alot considering the commotion we were making. This is in a place where the local women go into the sea fully clothed!!!

Later when we were covering oursleves in the natural mud, hoping to absorb the healing qualities and get whatever minerals and goodness we were supposed to get from it, we caught a local man filming us with his camcorder. " Are you going to go back in?" he said. Say no more!

There were no taxi's outside and after 15 minutes with our thumbs halfhearedly out a van stopped and offered to take us to the bus stop. His ife story and the history of being a representative for a sea shoe company later he offered to take us to Amman as he was going anyway. He seemed genuine, but when we arrived he wanted a 'donation' for the driver, his colleague. He got his donation and more. It would have been good to have our last full day end with a legacy of genourosity and honesty for the Jordanian people. Instead we spent even more money on great food at Books@cafe and only just managed the walk home.

Knackered. Thats the only word that wound have accurately described us. Over the last four or five days we'd changed countries, climbed a mountain and done an extended extreme Petra tour, some of us without camel or donkey help. Couple this with the fact that we'd been subsisting off a virtually falafel only diet, with the ocasional kebab thrown in for protein, and you've got three very tired bunnies!

So we did what all tired people would do when faced with a long distance to go and a whole lot to do in it... we called a cab... The first driver we spoke to we didn't like so I quoted a price he was bound to refuse and sent him packing. The second was really nice, we shook on the deal and got ready to go visit Jordans less than famous, but groovy nonetheless crusader Castles.

Travelling in style has sometimes suited us. I rode shotgun through the expansive desert hills of Jordan while Amanda and Judith sat in the back and carried on the conversation they seem to have started at the airport and never once let up from. The driver shook me awake from a pleasant dream at the first castle, the mighty Shobak. Built by a crusdader king unself-conscious enough to be called Baldwin I in 1115 this place resisted the vigorous attacks of Saladin for all of seventy four years when he pounded the walls down and took it as his own.

The Mamluks restored the walls and made it a working stronghold again, as they did with so many places in the region, so it wasn't in too sorry a state when we arrived. Builders were in there restoring it to its former glory and much was left of the walls and old fortress to wander around and admire. Walking past a pile of rubble they'd built up from their diggings Amanda spotted a sizable chunk of pottery which, once cleaned had to have been a good few centuries old. It looked just like the pieces we saw in a museum later in the day. One of the builders saw her pocket it excitedly, but wasn't all that bothered.

Another builder showed us the start of a very long tunnel heading downwards into the blackness. Ever one for adventure Amanda and I started down with the aid of the torch we'd remembered for once. About half way down Amanda turned back as she was wearing flip-flops but I managed to struggle down all 365 so called steps to the dry stream at the bottom. I found a little ladder that climbed to a hole in the ground far down from the castle and poked my head out for a look. At exactly this moment the taxi driver we'd dismissed that morning turned the corner and screeched to a halt for a chat with his two bewildered tourists in the back. Just my luck... I made my excuses and scrambled up the steps and slopes back to the castle where Amanda was getting ready to send a search party in there after me.

I must have fallen asleep again in the car to Kerak because it seemed to take no time at all to get there. I looked up suddenly, as if from a dream and there in front of me was an enormous castle wall, looming ominously over a deep ditch. This was cool, we went for a quick ice cream to get over our excitement.

This proved a bad idea, the guy working in the shop started to seriously lay into Amanda and I for hugging in the street, something they are clearly not allowed to do in Islamic society, so why should they put up with anyone else doing it. After Amanda had finished shouting at him for being a hypocrit and having MTV on in his restaraunt, we hurried to the castle bridge, nearly getting blown off our feet by the highland winds ripping accross the castle, and finally made it inside. Next to Crac de Chevalier this is the second largest castle in the Middle East. Built in its current form during the 12th century by the crusaders there has actually been fortifications here since biblical times. It became famous for a trime as the lynch-pin castle of the crusades with Saladin constantly vying with the Christian knights for its mastery. None of this violence is evident today though. The walls are quiet and much of the inside has crumbled or been filled with dirt and debris.

Stepping out into the howling winds again we descended to the outer court and had a quick look around the museum (where Amanda's pot was) before some guards let us into a few tunnels and barrack rooms underneath. From the courtyard we could see just how massive the walls of the inner keep were, dotted with towers and covered with all manner of cunning trickeries of war, I wouldn't have wanted to be the poor guy told to take this place.

Inside the main castle it was a little less orderly. Most of the buildings had been overgrown or claimed by the dust and wind. We managed to find the big tower at the back without much trouble, and the old Mamluk palace. But the Crusader church eluded us for a while and we weren't even looking looking for the kitchens when we stumbled upon them. All in all it was a really impressive place which we spent far too long exploring. The taxi driver was making distressed rumbling noises about the time he would get back home that day which we eagerly ignored.

As the wind was picking up to hurricane proportions we sped away back to the Kings Highway. Waves of dust and desert sand were being whipped up in a huge sandstorm as we drove to Amman so that at times we couldn't see two feet ahead. Somehow we made it through though and into the capital in the style we would live to become accostomed to. Our driver dropped us off right next to the Farah Hotel where we'd stayed before and we thanked him heartily. Ten minutes later we were changing hotels (womans prorogative) to a more snazzy one up the street... well it was the same price for a nicer room AND breakfast. I had no problems with that.

The pollution of the city was just as I remembered it. Withing ten minutes I could feel a layer of grime on my skin. Not to worry though, I could have a shower tonight and look forward to the next day when we would be bathing ourselves in the unsinkable waters of the Dead Sea.

Now I've seen a good number of ruins in my time. It's not like I'm up there with Lara Croft or anything but I would count myself on a par at least with that guy from "The Mummy", or maybe Poirot in "Death on the Nile". So I think I have sufficient authority on the subject of old piles of rock to say without contradiction that Petra is in fact a highly bloody fantastic place.

And I would go further... I do not sport a degree in Middle Eastern Archaeology, nor have I studied classical or ancient history to any great depth, but I believe I am sufficiently knowledgable in regard to the above subjects to state that Petra is actually a very, very interesting place indeed.

It was with these two foundations of knowledge that Amanda and I, both in full accord decided to share the delights of the Rose City of the Nabateans with Judith on her trip to see us. We were fairly confident that she would like it, assuming she could survive the climbing of course.

Tears at the Treasury

We didn't get up at five to see the place, there was no need to be so uncivilised. A hearty breakfast and a quiet stroll to the start of the Siq was ample adventure for the time of day. There were several other tourists about, but not so many that they would get in the way. Since the bombings in Amman, Sinai and Lebanon less and less people are coming out to see this part of the world. Bad for the locals of course but on a purely selfish note, quite good for us. At the end of the thin canyon entrance to the city we suddenly encountered the Treasury, a beautiful carved facade, as striking for its surprise appearance as for its craft. Judith, wiping a few tears from her eyes steadfastly withstood the tide of a European bus group to take a stream of pictures... definitely her daughters mum.

Reunion with the Bedouin boys

As we knew we would, we met up with a couple of the Bedouin lads we had first got to know on our last trip to Petra in November, then again in Dahab during the new Year. During a protracted reunion involving lots of tea, hugs and promises to meet later for a campfire Judith got to ride a camel (Solomon's), then a donkey (Amr's) all the way to the toilet. They knew how to treat us with style!

High Place Sacrifice

To break us all in we climbed the 45 minutes to the top of the 'High Place of Sacrafice' only to find a group of evangelical Americans, praying thanks to God for delivering them from those everlasting stairs. It was a little dissapointing. They left quickly however, on a pilgrimage to the ice cream stall I believe, and we were left alone with the astonishing view, and a family of Bedouins playing a flute, badly but with spirit.

On Top Of The World!

Amanda and I had passed this route the last time we were in Petra so we knew that the long walk town the other side of the ridge was fantastic. Slowly we descended, past the Nabatean Lion fountain carved into the rock. Amr's Auntie was still there as we remembered, smiling all over her tattoo'd face, trying to sell beads and bedouin tea to all visitors. We felt like we were on top of the world. On the way down were a number of beautifully carved tombs, what looked like a witches house perched on a rock, 16 square metre cistern for water and a tomb dedicated to a lowly Roman soldier, the only one in existance. All the rocks that surrounded us, the carved buildings and tombs, the cliffs and peaks shone with a pink glow in the afternoon sun. If you looked a little closer though swirls of colour were easily apparant, reds and blues mixing in random harmony. It was like an unfinished watercolour, the brush-strokes still visible on the canvas mixing opposing colours to create such glorious results.

2'000 Yrs on, they still know every inch

Eventually we wandered too far, we all had tired feet and our water supply was down to droplets. We retreated hastily back to the beaten track and embarked upon our own little pilgrimage for ice cream. Amr was waiting with a donkey to take Judith to the Bedouin village and Amanda and I had to make do with doggedly following behind, a journey of at least another three quarters of an hour...uphill! Amr had invited a couple of Australian girls along and wanted us all to hurry so he could go and pick them up so we got an occasional shout for speed from the donkey ahead. But the day was dying and the mountain views were a picture. I'm afraid we didn't entertain his need for haste very much.

Delivered by donkey to the Beduoin Village

The three of us white folk were casually dumped with Amr's family in the village while he ran off again to seek a bit of Antipodean skirt. His Auntie was there, face tatoo's and all, and his mother, who proceeded to roll an enormous spliff from the loose leaves in her bag and attempt to sell us genuine Nabatean coins. The Bedouin find them in dry stream beds, washed out of their age old graves in the soil. We declined respectfully.

By the time Amr returned we were surrounded by his large extended family trying to get over a language barrier so vast "hello" represents a major achievement. I was so engrossed in talking to the small naked boy in front of me that I failed to notice the third girl in the newcome group until Amanda began shouting. Of course it was Halla. Not content to follow us to Jerusalem, she also had to find us here too, on top of a hill in a random Bedouins house in the middle of Petra after closing time. I don't believe the world is that small, paranoia was starting to set in.

BBq's in the mountians at midnight

Introductions complete, we jumped into a pick up truck with Amr, Halla and her Australian charges (she was their (irresponsible) tour leader), Audi and Ahmad and headed for the hills. The night was a resounding success. We had Chicken Mansaf cooked the Bedouin way over the dying embers of a campfire, played music, told jokes and sang songs. By the end Judith was tired beyond belief and Halla was beginning to worry about her ability to lead the next days tour. A night well spent I think. We were kindly driven back to our hotel where the manager called off his search for what he believed must be our dead and cold bodies, and as soon as our heads hit the pillows we were fast asleep. I think we all will have dreamed of strawberry cream sundaes and Egyptian stalkers that night.

Petra's Siq
Petra day two started later than we'd planned. Much later. Eventually, with aching legs, a result of at least twelve hours walking the day before, we made it to the Siq for the last time, in the daylight atleast.

Inside the City we met the Bedouin lads one by one. Amr it seemed got a little lucky the night before so a lot of lighthearted teasing was in order. We said we'd meet him later but he was too tired and had to go home... poor lamb. We set to tackling the southern Tombs of Petra, a task that involved yet more climbing and clambering over rocks. After successfully negotiating a rather deep but mercifully dry stream bed we sat for lunch at the ruins of a beautifully mosaic floored Byzantine Church before making our way, finally to the Monastery.

The Monastry, leaving the best till last

This is quite a climb, the day was threatening to close and we couldnt leave without doing it, so, breating in a good breathe we all steeled ourselves for a little pain and started up.

Some twit coming the other way told us (at around the halfway point) that the cafe at the top was closing when he started to descend. Upset at the thought of no tea when we got to the top I accepted the rather herculean task of holding the cafe long enough for the ladies to climb the rest of the way and legged it up to the top quick smart. The result was that I got to see the look on Judiths face when she panted round the corner and saw the Manastery in all its glory,. It is the biggest, and I think the best building in the whole place. Well worth the effort. Of course the cafe had no intention of closing by the way. The guy we met must have seen one of the guys slip off to toilet or something. There was plenty of tea for everyone.

That night, well after the sun went down we were the absolute last of the tourists to leave Petra. We met Solomon near the Siq, getting ready to spend the night in his favourite cave, said a sad fairwell and had to explain our way past the guard at the gate who couldn't believe we'd come out so late.

Our hotel man had learned from past experience by now and hadn't called the police by the time we got home. We each had a hot shower (though some were hotter than others I'm sure) and stretched out into our beds for one last night before Crusader castles and Amman. Petra had once again failed miserably to dissapoint. A blind mute could visit the place and still be affected by its quiet history and rugged beauty. The old city has a power buried deep within its stones to enchant you as soon as you step inside. That was my fourth time visiting the place... I would happily go again tomorrow....and the next day.