Back in the UK

There's a distinct lack of photos for this blog entry. The only one's taken are from Brian's long (17.2 mile) training walk for the West Highland Way. Starting and finishing in Alvechurch, it went over the Lickey Hills, Waseley Country Park, up to the Clent Hills and then back again. This is near the start on the canal bridge at Withybed Green in Alvechurch near The Crown pub, one of five pubs in our village  

A week has gone by, in the blink of an eye, we had a good Monday Club with Tim, Mark and Fiona at the Weighbridge, in Alvechurch, very convenient for us. Tonight will be a much more traditional meeting, Old Moseley Arms followed by Diwans for a curry. Looking forward to that.

The bluebells are coming into flower now, carpeting woodlands and fields in a sea of blue. Give it another few days and it will be a full blue carpet 

We’ve done lots of boring but necessary things, shopping, cleaning, pottering, as singles, couples, and threes. Medical for mum and Brian, my dentist for today was cancelled.

Saturday we went to see Jonathan, Lucy and Caroline which was lovely, haven’t seen them for ages. Caroline had cooked her signature chocolate brownies which are yummy, in fact I might just sneak off and have one. Brian is out walking, it’s not long now till the West Highland Way, and mum is at knit and natter.

Taken from the top of Beacon Hill, the highest point on the Lickey Hills. Right of centre are the high rise buildings in Birmingham City Centre 

Yesterday was the rehearsal for Fiona and James’s wedding, good to see Steph and Sam with Rory and Ivy, the pageboy and flower girl. Jenny was amazingly controlled as, somehow, a wasp got up her trousers and stung her four times! Poor thing. We then went to the pub and had a glass of wine or two, more wedding talk, obviously but with less than a week to go, only to be expected.

Our exciting news however, is that after our auditions at the beginning of March, we have both been invited to participate in both the opening and closing ceremonies of the Commonwealth Games. People keep saying they’ll be looking for us, I hope no one sees us as that will probably mean one of us has fallen over! We don’t know what is involved yet, and even if we did we have been sworn to secrecy! We are really looking forward to it!

This one's further on, on top of the Windmill Hill in Waseley Country Park. Left are the Clent Hills, Stourbridge and Halesowen stretch out to the right 

I wrote this on Monday, it’s now Wednesday, and with nothing to report, except seeing Alex and Rob before Monday Club Curry, and seeing Jo and Mike yesterday evening, we still seem to have been ridiculously busy

This was as far as I got. Walton Hill in the Clent Hills. From here I started back towards Alvechurch, completing a distance of 27.6km with 628m of ascent in just over 6 hours and with sore feet and aching legs. The good news for me is that this is longer and with more ascent than the longest day of the West Highland Way, the bad news is that I'll have 8 days of long days like this! I hope I can do it! Wednesday 4th May next week is when we start it

To see a Relive video of my walk click here

Jordan - Petra to Aqaba and back to Amman

What do you think?

After Petra, which was full on, though with the benefit of three nights in the same place, the trip calmed down a little. Our final night there was a cookery demonstration, of how our very tasty meal was cooked, a rice dish, similar to a biryani. We left Petra for Wadi Rum and a Bedouin camp in a communal tent (camp location: 29°38'48.8"N 35°28'44.4"E). 18 of us would have been cosy, but by the time we got there 14 had decided to pay the extra for double, twin or for the family, triple private tents with en-suite. This left Brian and I, Renee and Linda, with loads of space, and loads of bedding to make ourselves comfortable.

She didn't mention the stop we made on the way to the Wadi Rum camp at Wadi Rum Station (location: 29°41'56.2"N 35°23'48.99"E). This railway was used by T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) in WW1 to fight back the Ottoman Turks. It's still in use today though only for transporting some freight. However, looking at the tracks it's a wonder how. The steam train won't be running again, but there is a bypass track alongside

Good excuse to have a good chat!

We’d got there via bus, and 4 wheel drive truck (location: 29°38'21.43"N 35°26'05.54"E) across the desert and camel, which was interesting enough though don’t think we’ll rush to repeat it. We all went out to watch sunset, though perhaps Brian and I led Henry and Toby astray, climbing up the rock everyone else was sitting at the base of.

Arriving at the visitior centre for our 4-wheel desert drive experience. According to Abdullah the rock you see in the centre is called the Seven Pillars of Wisdom and the feature T E Lawrence referred to in his book. However, Paul, who has read the book says that's not the case

Dinner was delicious, chicken, lamb and vegetables, all cooked in a hole in the ground, same principle as our thermal cooker, but much more impressive when it came out. Dancing around the campfire before bed all made for a good evening.

Here we are already to go. We're in the right hand truck (photo by Abdullah)

Up the following morning to Aqaba, and the very small piece of Red Sea coast Jordan has, a glass bottomed boat and snorkelling for some. I’d already decided not to snorkel as I’d had a cold, and a headache, but was joined by many when they saw the current and possibly how little there seemed to be to see through the glass bottom. It was a pleasant trip though with a lovely lunch, that was delivered by motor launch! Another stop for swimming in a more sheltered spot, led to jumping in and larking about. Having eaten all my lunch, I really didn’t want dinner, but went out with everyone else to a restaurant that wasn’t ‘dry’ a couple of beers and part of Brian’s dinner, and we were both stuffed. We have eaten an awful lot on this trip.

After a short drive into the desert they stopped and told us we had to walk up this hill. Not sure why, but we did anyway

Our last day was quite a long drive back to Amman, with a break for swimming in the Dead Sea (location: 31°45'05.412N 35°35'27.12"E). I’d been in the Dead Sea, nearly 40 years ago when I went on a trip on the SS Uganda, the schools cruise ship. It was just as weird, you really do float, and it is quite hard to get your feet down to walk out. Slightly nerve wracking in that my bikini top was being held together by the world’s smallest safety pin. Fortunately no embarrassment ensued, and our skin did feel lovely and soft after, even though we didn’t cover ourselves in mud. That was just too much! With that, back to the hotel we started from (Toledo Hotel), and back out to the place we had sampled falafel from on the first day. Sit down this time, tables on the street, a new plastic sheet, no plates, just bread that you used to dip and wrap, absolutely delicious, great way to finish and only 4 Dinar, when every other meal, lunch and dinner has been around 12, before drinks, this was a great way to finish. Abdullah and his son joined us for a quick coffee, before a relatively early bed. Well, B&I, and Allan and Emma were being collected for the airport at 04.30!

Nice view from the top, but the soft sand and the heat of the day made us realise we never want to be lost in the desert, you'd have little chance of survival if you got lost

This was as expected far too early, but it all went very smoothly, arriving early to no queues at all at passport control, and luggage coming out together. Back to the hotel to collect the car, and up the motorway to mum. Very early night and we just about feel human.

They all stopped down there - very sensible!

Shopping, washing, unpacking and gardening today, a chicken roasting and meeting the Monday Club boys later. Fab

Look at that! Proper Lawrence of Arabia!

And then we were on our camel ride

There's Jackie

And there's me with my arm raised desperately trying to look cool!

Proper desert caravan

Back in the 4-wheel drive trucks again - and this time they drove like the wind! This is Paul and Jan hanging on for dear life!

Here's the camp in the desert. We were in the big communal tent you can see at the bottom, the others had their own private tents with en-suite and air-con. Somehow, to us, a mattress on the floor and a communal tent was somehow more 'camping in the desert', but we understand why the others wanted comfort 

Waiting for the sunset. Another photo by Abdullah, he does take excellent photos

However, so does Natalie, this is one of hers and I think this is one of the best photos I've seen. The camel rider is actually looking at his mobile phone which, somehow brings together the old and the new 

As it happened, the sunset was nothing special, mainly as there were no clouds in the sky

I'd like to say we danced round the campfire till dawn, but actually it was 10:30!

A nice communal room to sit and chat in

Oh, must put this photo on of someone (no-one we knew) being pulled along on a board behind a truck

This is where we slept, just four of us in here for the night

Next day after breakfast waiting to depart. That's Jackie, Paul, Jan (both from our village) and Renee from California

On to Aqaba on the Red Sea for our snorkeling trip and a look through the glass bottom

Sitting round the glass in the bottom looking at the coral

A sunken plane (on purpose) to allow coral to grow

I took lots of photos through the glass of the coral, here's just one of them

I did so want someone to swim underneath and, here, the guide obliged

The two young lads kept us entertained

And so did Renee - good on her

You may think this is a boring photo, but it contains three countries. The metal harbour on the right is in Jordan, the darker headland from the right to three quarters across is Israel and the lighter hills on the left are in Egypt

Our evening meal in Aqaba. That's us behind the fountain

And here's a better photo. That's Bertin and Natalie in the front, then, on the left Renee, Emma, Jackie, a spare seat where I was sitting, Jan, Paul and I can't quite see who's at the bottom. Abdullah is standing on the right

We were off again the next day for a four hour drive to the Dead Sea. On the way we saw Lots cave, it's that building there halfway up that hill. From here, according to the Bible he moved up to higher ground to escape the destruction of Sodom and Gomorra, traces of which have been found as burnt fragments under ground 

And this, according to Abdullah is supposed to be Lots wife who was turned to a pillar of salt when she turned to look at the destruction

Dead Sea viewpoint. It's 433m below sea level in the Great Rift Valley. A couple of interesting points here: The Great Rift Valley stretches from Lebanon in the north, all along between Jordan and Israel, down the Red Sea and down the east side of Africa. It is caused by two tectonic plates pulling apart that will, in many millions of years be separated by a huge ocean like the Atlantic. The other interesting fact is that at 433m below sea level (the lowest point on the earth's surface), air pressure is 6% higher that at sea level, on average at 1060mBar. The higher pressure causes water to boil at a slightly higher temperature. It will boil at about 101.5 C. A third interesting fact is the level of the Dead Sea is falling by about 1m per year due to river waters being diverted for land irrigation. If left unchecked the Dead Sea will be dry within 50 years. A project is underway which, if successful, will see a pipe laid from the Red Sea to allow water to flow into the Dead Sea to maintain its level (the Red Sea to Dead Sea pipe), but it requires delicate negotiations as the pipe would need to pass through several countries

The white deposits are salt. The Dead Sea receives it's water from the Jordan River, but there is no outflow, only evaporation. The salt content is 33.5%, much higher than normal sea, making it denser and giving a greater buoyancy which means you float higher in the water. You mustn't put your head underwater or stay in for longer than about half an hour. Don't go in if you have any cuts on you, even tiny grazes, the salt will find it! 

Here we go, heading in

There's Jenny and Anna showing us how to float

And then we had a go. What a wierd feeling, waving your arms propelled you easily through the water, but it was really quite difficult to lower your legs to stand on the bottom, the water kept pushing them back up

We had a couple of hours at the Dead Sea and then we were off again back to Amman and the hotel we started at 9 days ago. Here we are in Amman centre for our last (and cheapest) meal. It's Ramadan at the moment, which means Muslim's cannot eat or drink during daylight hours so, at 7:00pm, when they can eat, everywhere is packed. They eat very quickly and, half hour later they are gone. We timed our arrival for 7:30, many Muslims were leaving and they pulled together newly vacated tables on the pavement for us. We had falafels, with lots of mezes and bread, washed down with tea (no alcohol!). Delicious, cheap and so much fun

Last time together at a shisha bar (we just had soft drinks). The lad on the right next to Abdullah is his 12 year old son. After this we went home to bed, ready for our 03:50 wakeup call to head to the airport for our journey home. The end of a hectic but very enjoyable trip

Jordan - Amman to Petra

Our Explore team in Jordan. LtoR: Toby (back to us), Anna, Martin & Cheryl (with the camera), Renee, Helen, Jenny, Emma, Gwen, Lindaa, Jackie, Henry, Brian, Natalie, Bertin, Paul, Jan & Allan

The Arch of Hadrian, Jerash Roman city

Our journey to Jordan was without problems, and again, we walked off the plane and were met, before passport control, by a man with our names. He whisked us through in double quick time, without the need for a visa, and put us in a car to deliver to our hotel (Toledo Hotel, Amman). We arrived to find notices for three Explore trips, will we be with Jan and Paul?

The Colonnaded street in Jerash, one of the best preserved Greco-Roman cities, known in Roman times as Gerasa. Originally founded by Alexander the Great it was developed by the Romans after their conquest in 63BC 

Jackie at the top of the Amphitheatre

A scarily civilised start with on Sunday morning, and yes we were, along with 14 others, making a group of 18, which is big. We are on a proper coach, with WiFi, which actually works most of the time! Not conducive to chatting however. We are 4 couples, a mum and 17 and 20 year old boys, a single man, and 6 single women, one from the USA and one from Oz. It’s a big group, a short time, and lots of names, which we have just about got sorted. The tour leader, Abdullah, however appears to have made no effort, though he did tell me he thought 18 was too few, he could quite happily do 25! As a tour leader he is probably ok, he knows his history, though we have the impression he sometimes makes things up if asked questions. As a group leader we feel there is something lacking, and he’s certainly not Wael!

Abdullah, our tour leader showing his prowess by gently rocking this column. He placed a spoon in the gap, if you look carefully you can see it, but its a bit blurred as it's moving up and down

And this little fella came to have a look to see what was going on

The first day was spent in Amman, visiting the Jerash, a huge Roman town, one of the best preserved in the world, and the Citadel. We then had a quick walk through Amman to give us some options for later. Having had a big lunch (they’ve all been set price buffets, so you’ve paid, you’ve got to eat) dinner was not on the cards. We did however go for a quick amble with Jan and Paul, sampling a very strange snack Abdullah had recommended, stringy cheese with a sweet honey topping! Bizarre, but not horrible, we won’t hunt it out, but not horrible! We then had an ice cream and a pomegranate juice. Alcohol has been very hard to find, I suspect it would be hard anyway, but is much harder in Ramadan.

And here he is banging on a drum while someone plays the bagpipes. Yes, bagpipes!

At the Citadel with great views over Amman city

The second day we went to Madaba, a town with a strong Christian heritage and a lot of Byzantine mosaics, some of which have been pictured in the book Brian is reading, so he as quite excited. We then went to Mount Nebo where Moses looked over the Promised Land. After lunch a crusader stronghold at Kerak before driving to Petra, via a “shortcut” to a fabulous viewpoint we are very impressed the bus driver could do!

See this flag and pole flying high over Amman? Apparently this flagpole is in the Guinness Book Of Records as the worlds highest pole. As I took this photograph Paul was behind me and said 'that's got delete written all over it', well, you were wrong weren't you Paul 

Petra has been stunning (our hotel: Edom Hotel). We’ve had two days here, the first led by Abdullah, till lunch when most of us headed up to the monastery, and today on our own. Brian obviously wanted to do the high points, so we set off to 07.10 to go to the high place of sacrifice and the viewpoint over the treasury. Yesterday was 10 miles, today 8, before lunch and a guided outing to Little Petra. We’ve visited the museum, not gone to the hammam for massage, and met lots of lovely cats. They do seem very friendly here. Hence time for a very quick blog!

The Christian church in Madaba that was built over a huge 22m mosaic  and partly destroyed. The mosaic has since been identified as very valuable, but only bits of it survive now. Two parts of it are mentioned in the book I'm currently reading 'In the Shadow of the Sword' by Tom Holland, a very good book tracing the origins of Judaism, Christianity and Islam

This bit is showing Christian Jerusalem

On to  Mount Nebo and this, for me was one of the highlights. It's not a very clear day, but down there on the left is the Dead Sea and there's a thin green line extending rightwards from it. That's the River Jordan and marks the border between Jordan and Israel. Beyond the river is the West Bank, occupied by Israel. Jesus was said to have been baptised by John the Baptist down there on the river and it was from this spot that, according to the Old Testament, Moses came to look across to the Promised Land. Whatever your beliefs, there is no doubt that this area, and this spot have been written and talked about for two thousand years, history and religion is oozing from every crack and to be here is just fabulous. Delighted to have been here

This is the church built on top of an older church on top of the mount. Beautiful mosaics here

No time to rest, we went via a mosaic school to Kerak castle, a crusader castle built in the 11th century in surprisingly good condition

And here's that fabulous viewpoint our coach driver did some pretty fancy driving to get to

Did we mention it was windy? Very windy! 1600m above sea level and we were looking down towards the Dead Sea at 400m below sea level (the lowest point on the earths surface)

So finally, after a long day we arrived at Petra, our main sight on this trip. After a meal we were directed by Abdullah to this bar that sold alcohol - a rarity in Jordan and even more so during Ramadan. Except that we didn't bother, £9 for a pint of gassy beer we decided we weren't that bothered!

Big day the next day, our walking tour of Petra, Here's Abdullah giving us the intro

So here we are walking down the very narrow gorge, waiting for the big reveal of the iconic Treasury that we all know as Petra. Nothing could add to the excitement and anticipation more than knowing it will suddenly appear round one of the canyons turns. I'm using Abdullah's photos here as his photos are better than mine 

Here it comes, just a few steps more...

And bam, there it is, complete with all of us. Cue Indiana Jones Music! Established by the Nabateans in the 1st century BC. This monument, the best known of several hundred on this site is carved in one piece from the surrounding rock

To be honest with you, I don't know which of the several hundred photos I have at my disposal which to put on here. It is of such staggering beauty and scale that it has to been seen to be believed

We had two days here on one ticket, one day with Abdullah guiding us and a second on our own, but with a very good idea by then of what we wanted to see

Look at the colours of the rocks here. And what's going on here? Abdullah got everyone up here doing this sort of stuff

This was today, our second, free day (actually half day as we went to 'Little Petra' in the afternoon). Saw this bird, it's got a very tuneful tweet, a black beak and an orange flash to it's wing tips. Any idea Helen? Late amendment: Helen says it's a red winged starling. Thank you Helen

So the previous days walk was 10 miles and today we did an 8 miler, starting with a walk up very steep steps to the place of high sacrifice. My book tells me there used to be human sacrifices up there!

But before I do that, I forgot to put in the longest leg of yesterdays walk, right up to the Monastery, the second most regarded building in Petra. It was a long uphill walk to get here, but it was worth it

But it was necessary to walk a further 10 minutes up to get to the highest point and get this rather lovely view. The best view in the world the sign at the bottom says. They have signs like that at the start of lots of long uphill walks!

And this was then the view back down to the Monastery

Back to today and here's the place of High Sacrifice. Nice view, but the place where humans have been sacrificed

On that spot there so they say

A bit further on and you can peer over a sheer drop to the valley below and see some of those stone carvings

Look at this obelisk here near the summit. It's carved from the rock and is part of the rock. The surrounding rock has been removed to leave this

On our way down and who should we meet on their way up? Jan and Paul

So we'd gone all the way down, past some of these fabulous rock tombs and then...

We had to go all the way back up again to see the Treasury from above. 'We don't have to' Jackie said. Well that's ridiculous, of course we have to!

Nice view of the amphitheatre way below as we go higher

And after another 20 minutes or so we arrived at a precipitous edge with a fine view down to the Treasury. No fences or any safety measures, you just walk as close to the vertical drop as you feel comfortable doing. And there were lots of people creeping to edges trying to look cool while someone took a photo. So, of course, I had to be one of them!

It's a long way down! You can look at a couple of short Relive video's with a lot more photos on if you'd like to. This one is yesterdays 10 miler with Abdullah and everyone: click here And this one is today's 8 miler taking in the high points: click here

So this afternoon we went on to Little Petra and, alongside the remains of a Neolithic village. These remains here we built by man 11,000 years ago. It must be one of early man's first settlements. Imagine that, those stones were placed by humans 11,000 years ago!

And here we are entering Little Petra, which is a smaller version of  rock buildings in a canyon. It was a commercial centre to service caravans. The caravans were left outside and business could be conducted in here

They placed a lot of emphasis on water collection as it's a desert area. See the vertical channel to the left here. Water is funneled down and into underground storage areas, not a drop was wasted apparently. Very ingenious channels and pipes are used. And all this is 2000 years old

Here we are taking a breather while Abdullah explains something

We could go up some stone steps into this one. Health and Safety at it's best here!

And it was worth it as all this original plaster and paint could still be seen 

The sign said 'Best View in the World, 6 minutes walk' so we had to go. Up the stone steps in that slot at the end

Well, it wasn't thee best view, but it was quite nice

It was also a nice place to stop and have a drink. Jackie was happy as she found another one of the many very cute little cats in Petra

Well that's about it for now. The trip so far has been full on, but really very good. Petra has lived up to it's reputation fully and is so worthwhile going to see. Tomorrow we're off camping in the desert at Wadi Rum, on to Aqaba, Jordan's only coastal  port, then back up to swim in the Dead Sea before heading home on Sunday. We may or may not get another blog in before the end, if not we'll finish off back at home. We have so many lovely photos of Petra and all and we've done lots of other stuff, such as cookery demonstrations and lots of great eating out. It's been a great experience so far, but very hectic. Looking forward to going home for a rest!