Guest Post by James: Jordan

11/20/22-11/28/22

Here’s another post, shared with permission, from 8-year-old James’ private blog. My Instagram posts appear below James’ writing. (Besides the Instagram posts, picture credits are all to James as well.)

Jordan was another big hit in our family, and we enjoyed it very much. Dad liked the inexpensive cost of travel, Mom liked the cardamon coffee, Charlie and I loved Wadi Rum (more on that later), and Henry liked looking at his phone all day.

First, we walked over the border of Israel to Jordan with our heavy backpacks like true travelers. After a short taxi, we stayed in Aqaba, a city on the Red Sea, for a few days. We stayed in a small hotel and watched “The Mummy” one night. We ate at a restaurant that only served chicken and rice, which I thought was strange and confusing. We swam in the Red Sea for a few hours, and we tried to find colorful fish with our new goggles.

After Aqaba, we rented a car and drove to Wadi Rum for a desert experience and camel rides. Wadi Rum, also known as “The Valley of the Moon,” is the largest valley in Jordan and is near Saudi Arabia. It is also a desert with tons of mountains and canyons, and we spent at least seven hours exploring them. Our open-air jeep made six stops in Wadi Rum. The first one was to climb up a steep, rocky mountain to see a really good view of the valley (I didn’t climb up). We also climbed up a lot of super awesome sand dunes; one of them had a big rocky hill on top.

We also walked one kilometer through a sandy canyon and went sandsurfing at the massive sandhill at the top!

full screen view

The most important stop was lunch! Our jeep drivers cooked an incredible chili-tomato-feta dish that was delicious. (It was like shakshuka but with feta cheese instead of eggs.) The next stop was a natural rock arch, which we could climb up. To end the day, we drank tea on top of a hill and watched the sun set. We spent the night in a beautiful Bedouin tent, but it was freezing outside.

After a buffet breakfast the next morning, we took a two hour camel ride through Wadi Rum back to the village where we started.

Mom and I had to share a camel and I was super crushed. About one kilometer from the village, I got off the camel and my legs felt wobbly and weird! It was really hard to walk at first, but I perservered! Because the Bedouin breakfast was sad, we ate a second breakfast in the village. The second breakfast was also sad, but two sad breakfasts equals one decent breakfast. It’s just math, people!

After Wadi Rum, we drove to the city of Petra. The actual city of Petra was terrible. It was really hilly and driving was awful. We couldn’t find good food, but I ate decent mac & cheese at a place called Meat on Fire.

While the city of Petra was a bust, the ancient city of Petra was incredible! We woke up before dawn to see the sun rise over the mountains and avoid other tourists. To get to the famous Treasury, we walked one mile through a very narrow canyon (parts were only one meter wide) that was full of water because of the recent rains. At the end of the canyon was the Treasury and it was stunning. We kept walking through the ancient city and saw the old theater.

We also saw a few hills and dogs.

I like taking photos of dogs in famous places (p.s sorry about my finger in the photo)

To get to the Monastery, we had to hike over a mountain because it was on top. The mountain was as tall as a sixty story building! While there were steps carved into the sandstone, it was very hard to walk up; Mom even fell hard on her way down! At the Monastery, there was a snack area and we really needed the rest. While the Treasury and Monastery were incredible, the best part of the day was the view from the mountains!

After Petra, we drove the King’s Highway to Madaba and Amman. In Madaba, we stayed at The Black Iris and I wish we stayed there longer. Because it rained all day, I stayed in the hotel with Henry and Charlie while Mom and Dad saw the ancient Roman mosaics and a bunch of churches. We then drove to Amman, where we visited the Jordan Museum. The museum had interactive games in the kids section and a lot of other things about Jordan. We also visited Rainbow Street, drank hot chocolate at a cafe, and bought cookies from a bake sale that was raising money for Syrian refugees.

From Amman, we flew to India and got really sick.

In case you’re wondering, I’ll do at least one more James guest post so you can read about that last part. Here are my Instagram posts with the country counter after: