Middle East Trip: Petra

Petra, in southern Jordan, is the kind of place I put on my list of things to see before I die…but never expect to actually see.  Life is certainly full of surprises.

All of the hotels near Petra are located in the town of Wadi Musa, just outside the site’s gates.  Staying there that first night, it was tantalizing to know we were so close to such an amazing place but couldn’t see any hint of it yet.  We tried not to torture ourselves thinking about it, though, and went to bed early, so we could get up and hit the trail before the masses.

Although more than one civilization has lived in the Petra valley, the people responsible for its famous structures are the Nabateans.  They were at their height between the first centuries B.C. and A.D., but their Bedouin descendents still live in and around the area to this day.

Touring Petra is a full day of walking, and it begins on a wide path beneath cliffs called the Bab as-Siq.  I didn’t expect to see any ruins on this path, but this was the first of many times I underestimated this incredible place, as right away we passed by the Obelisk Tomb (above) and the Bab as-Siq Triclinium (below—where the funeral banquets were held). 

After walking on the path for a while, the way narrows as you enter the Siq gorge. 
I can already tell this post will be repetitive because the whole day found me astounded again and again, and one thing I know I will sound like a broken record about is the stunning color of the rocks. 
The Siq is long and winding, and it’s easy to get so caught up in looking at the towering rock faces that you forget you’re getting close to the city.  Forget, that is, until you round this corner and see a glimpse of the Treasury through the mouth of the gorge. 
Then you see this. 
The Treasury is easily the most photographed part of Petra, and it’s easy to see why.  We had heard the prettiest times to see it were mid-morning (when these pictures were taken) and early evening (which you’ll see at the end of the post).  Because it’s protected from the elements by the surrounding cliffs, the Treasury is unbelievably intact, as you can see from this close-up. 
You may remember this building from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, but in reality there is nothing inside except some small rooms branching off from the main chamber.  I’ll take the swirling colors of the walls over crusader seals any day, though. 

Now, this is where my prior knowledge of Petra ended.  The Treasury was the only part I’d ever seen pictures of, so I couldn’t figure out why the guidebook insisted we’d need to spend an entire day here to even scratch the surface.  Like I said, I underestimated the place.  It turns out the city sprawls all over the valley, so what we had to do was decide what to explore first.  Here I am consulting the map with the Treasury in the background.  (We used the Rough Guide to Jordan, by the way, and the section on Petra was invaluable.) 
First, we walked by the Street of Facades… 
…and then poked around these unnamed tombs. 

There are two major side hikes within Petra, so we decided to do the first before the sun got too far up in the sky.  This one led to what is know as the High Place of Sacrifice, and you can see from this photo that the first part of the name is fitting.  You can also begin to see what I mean by how extensive the site is. 
This shot looks back along the stairs we climbed. 
And this is the sacrificial altar at the top.  Historians don’t know exactly what took place up here, but there is some evidence of human sacrifices.  Whatever it was, it likely was in honor of the Nabatean god Dushara. 

After coming back down from here, we wandered around the side of the one of the cliffs.  Petra gets thousands of visitors a day, but because it’s so big, it was common to find ourselves completely alone for long periods of time.  These particular cliffs were lined with interesting curves of the rock on their surface…
…which provided novel vantage points looking out from the inside. 
This is facing back toward where we started. 
The theater seems like it would have been built during the time of Roman annexation, but it is actually from before that, during the first century A.D.—it’s clear, though, that the Roman influence was already strong. 

As I mentioned, even though Petra is a protected site, the Bedouins are allowed to continue living there.  At one point, we came across two older Bedouin men drinking tea in the shade of some boulders, and they invited us to sit down and have a cup with them—after our experiences in Syria, people’s generous hospitality no longer surprised us, so we readily agreed.  We chatted with them for some time (most people in Jordan speak at least some English), and just as we were about to leave, they showed up some ancient coins they had found near one of the tombs. 
They offered to sell us one of them, but of course we declined, since it would have been totally illegal for us to buy artifacts like that.  Anjana’s face in this photo says it all. J 
We did enjoy our tea, though, and after thanking them, we continued on our way. 

Along an eastern cliff are a series of structures known collectively as the Royal Tombs.  The first one, the Urn Tomb, is easily accessible via several sets of stairs and sits above multiple stories of arched vaults. 
Here is a closer shot of the Urn Tomb’s façade.  This tomb is unique because the loculi (small openings where the bodies were placed) are visible from the exterior—you can see the three of them near the top of the columns.  Usually these are located inside the tomb, so historians think the visibility indicates a greater importance of whoever was buried here, possibly a Nabatean king. 
Most people see this main tomb and then head back down the stairs, but we worked our way around the cliff and were rewarded with views of the Silk Tomb, the Corinthian Tomb, and the Palace Tomb, all right next to each other.  (Sorry for the couple in the middle of the photo—we waited forever for them to leave, but they only moved further into the middle of the shot.  We needed Uncle Jim’s “people filter.”) 
Even further along the cliff is the isolated tomb of Sextius Florentinus, a Roman governor of the Province of Arabia, who died early in the second century A.D. and apparently chose to be buried in Petra.  Can’t say that I blame him. 

It was close to noon by this time, but before we stopped for lunch, we strolled down the Colonnaded Street—the main drag of the city center. 
Our one stop along the road was the Great Temple.  Historians don’t know which deity was worshipped here, but it’s clear that devotees would have climbed from the street up these stairs, which are so steep that you can’t see the main area until you’re at the top. 
The building is mostly collapsed, and Brian took this neat distance shot of some tombs with a toppled column in the foreground. 
An intriguing feature of this temple was the elephant-headed capitals; apparently, Nabatean sites are the only places in the world where these have been found. 

After lunch, we began our last major climb of the day: the route to the Monastery. 
Early in the hike, a side path branches off toward this simple shrine called the Lion Triclinium.  (You can’t see them in this photo, but there are two very faded lion carvings on either side of the entrance.) 
To get up to the actual entryway involved a steep scramble.  We had no trouble, but Anjana got stuck and wasn’t able to get down.  Brian to the rescue! 
Back on the main trail, you can see down into the deep gorge below for much of the way.  This is a pretty intense hike, but you know you’re nearing the end when you see the urn at the top of the Monastery’s façade peaking up over the ridge. 
The entire structure is massive—much bigger than the Treasury, but also less ornate. 
This is one of the only group photos we took during the day, and we all laugh that Anjana looks like our adopted daughter. 
We decided the best way to observe the temple (the name Monastery is technically inaccurate) was from this café in a cave opposite the façade.  We lingered here for quite a while, sipping cold fantas and taking in the view. 

It was late afternoon at this point, so we began our long hike back to Petra’s main entrance.  On the way down from the Monastery, we heard a strange sound in the distance—like someone shouting but not in panic.  It kept getting closer, and all of a sudden, this little Bedouin boy riding a mule came around the corner.  He was singing his heart out, completely unaware of or at least unconcerned about the tourists along the path.  It was such a happy little song, and while we chuckled, we took this short video.

By the time we got back to the Treasury, it was that magical window in the early evening when the rock begins to look more pink than orange.  Just beautiful. 
As we forced ourselves to head back to the hotel, we took one last shot through the Siq’s opening.  All in all, Petra far exceeded my expectations, and with its hours of climbing, exploring, gaping, and wondering, this day turned out to be one of the most satisfying of my entire life.  I would go back in a heartbeat. 

One more post to go!