The Dead Sea and Petra

Jordan has a large number of religious sites of interest to Christians, and we ended up visiting Mt,. Nebo, where Moses looked down upon the Promised Land that he was never to visit.

There's a church up there, with magical mosaics and nice views over the Dead Sea--which is where we were headed to float high in the water and cover ourselves with mud. You have to do it. Everybody does. Sigh. It was baking hot, and sweltering humidity.

Petra!~

But once down at the lowest point on Earth, there was nowhere to go but up, and that meant a drive to the once secret city of Petra. Once again, we found very few people here, and while we didn't have the place to ourselves, we did feel free to wander around and without any crowds at all.

The place is astonishing, and around every corner we found new delights. Ruins, of course, but also some slick rock hiking and views that took our breath away. We didn't really want to leave, but it was hot (high 90's) and by the time we left we were ready to hop in our air-conditioned van and drive south to Wadi Rum, past the strikingly austere landscape of Jordan.