Petra- fied....

April 3^rd

Aqaba (Petra), Jordan

I never thought when signing on for this job that I would get to see some world wonders for a very reasonable price. Its unreal the places I have been, and tomorrow I am going to Jerusalem. Funny thing is, we were never supposed to go there it was just added last minute.

Petra in Jordan (which was in the movie Indiana Jones) was just the most incredible place. The whole city is built in rock. These are ancient ruins. It is magnificent. The beauty of the rock is inexplainable. Honestly, I didn’t know it would be this amazing. Entire buildings and tombs were carved into the sandstone. There were people living in caves just because it was gorgeous there and the weather was perfect. I would have to describe it as the Grand Canyon on steroids. Or if any of you have seen 127 hours, the sand stone looked a lot like that, but bigger. I was just in awe of the beauty. I met a woman in one of the shops that was from New York. She visited a few years back, and decided to move there just because she fell in love with its beauty.

Now to the scary/ funny part of my adventure in Petra. After exploring the town, my friend Heather and I wanted to take a horse ride back to the entrance so we could make it back to our tour bus on time at 2:15. We had an hour and we asked these two young boys on donkeys if we could catch a ride. They said they didn’t go to the entrance, but they would take us on a short cut there if we paid them extra. We thought, why not? It sounds like it would be fun. So, this 16 year old boy, who smelled like a spicy armpit, took me on top of this poor donkey and started to go up several stairs. I felt so bad for this donkey since my guy was whipping the donkey and shouting “heroin” (which I guess means hurry in Arabic). Heather and I were laughing cause the donkeys would toot when things got too difficult climbing up the stairs. It was funny, but also sad. The view was spectacular from the top. We would see the entire city. But after a half hour goes by, I start to get worried. They said it would only take 30 minutes to get to the entrance and at this time, I couldn’t even see civilization. We asked, how much longer to the entrance…. And they said oh 15 minutes. I was really nervous, because we kept climbing higher and further away from people. These guys hopped on the back of our donkeys, and my guy started to get a little fresh. I realized at that moment that this may not have been the smartest idea to trust two teenage boys to take up back to the entrance in a middle-eastern country. So at this time, 2:00 rolls around…and I am starting to panick. We left our tour guide and didn’t tell anyone we would be going this route. In my mind I thought, oh dear, now we are going to be sold into slavery and taken far away. I told my guy to hurry, but he made me run part of the way in broken sandals. They almost weren’t going to take us. Heather was far ahead of me, and at this time it was 2:15. We were almost in tears, because we had no idea if they were even going to take us to the entrance. We also knew that our buses were going to leave without us since we were so late. We didn’t know the name of our port, or even a way to get back since it was 2 hours away. We were praying they wouldn’t leave us. Finally, we get to the bottom of the entrance and the buses were still miles away. I was thankful to make it to the bottom, but angry that they lied to us as to how much time it would take. It was around 2:25 at this point. I was sure the bus was gone. Heather then hops on a horse, and I hop on another one…I say, I have to go NOW! My horse guider ran with me and we galloped up the hill so incredibly fast. He was really nice actually and assured me the bus driver would not leave without me and if he did, he was going to personally take me back to the port. So, I felt a little better at that point. Heather is still in front of me, and we can’t find our buses. We are screwed at this point. I was so nervous. But then my horse guide told a security guide and he told us our bus was at the top waiting for us. I didn’t believe it until, there we found our buses. I was so relieved to have made it. My tour guide was just about to leave, but we made it. Thank the lord! Oh man, I guess, life wouldn’t have been too bad in Petra right? Haha phew!