Petra

The road to Petra began with an early wake up call at 630am and a 10 minute bus to the border where we walked across to Jordan in search of our Jordanian guide and driver. We found them by 9am -- and then waited and waited for passport clearance and who knows what. We hit the road, already an hour late, when the bus broke down on a wilderness highway. Overheated. So there we are, a bus full of American Jews hanging out on the roadside near Aqaba, which means near nothing at all. Our Jordanian guide, a bit of an oddball, seems undone by this, and begs our forgiveness. We're cool, though those who saw 'Babel' are just a tad nervous.

Eventually, another bus and driver arrives. Mahmoud opens the door, we crowd in and then he speeds off. And I mean, he speeds. We are over 2 hours behind schedule and the border closes at 8pm. We are rounding corners at a zillion miles an hour and from the back Ron says, "Let's get there safely", which is a good idea, only Mahmoud doesn't speak a word of English and our guide is still too freaked out over what happened to be of any use in the bus.

Of course we arrived safely, took the famous walk and saw this amazing sight:



I mean, there is lots to see, but rounding the famous bend and seeing this is just too much; it becomes fixed in one's brain forever. We all loved it. It was a strenuous walk, but my God, it is just so amazing.

We made it back to the border in time after a late lunch that almost degenerated into a pogrom when we started playing with our straws and then there was a little bit of spit ball action and our Jordanian waiter just about blew a gasket. At any rate, we're back, without international incident.