Wadi Rum
For us, a 4 hour jeep tour around the World Heritage Wadi Rum’s valleys, mountains, canyons and gorges, dunes and deserts in the sunset. An overnight stay in a “Martian Dome”. And a camel ride at dawn “to clear my senses by a night in Rumm and by the ride down its dawn-lit valley towards the shining plains” Lawrence, T.E. (1926) Seven Pillars of Wisdom. (Wadi means “valley”)
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Ottoman-Train.jpg)
At the Wadi Rum train station – the Ottoman train used to run from Istanbul to Medina in the early 1900s
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Lawrences-House.jpg)
This is the cave where Lawrence of Arabia lived in Wadi Rum
“Rumm was vast and echoing and God-like” Lawrence (of Arabia) wrote in Seven Pillars of Wisom and “Our little caravan grew self-conscious, and fell dead quiet, afraid and ashamed to flaunt its smallness in the presence of the stupendous hills”.
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Ancient-Script.jpg)
With thousands of petroglyphs and inscriptions dating back 12,000 years Wadi Rum is unique
And this bird is found only in Wadi Rum
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Dry-Lake.jpg)
In the wet season this is a lake
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Sunset.jpg)
“This sunset was fierce, stimulant, barbaric” – Seven Pillars of Wisdom
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Camels-at-Dawn.jpg)
In contrast, dawn is so quiet, cool and peaceful in the desert
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Martian.jpg)
Returning to our “Martian Dome”
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Pod.jpg)
Inspired by the film “The Martian”, these Domes now provide luxury accommodation in the desert
Dead Sea
It’s a 4 hour drive from Wadi Rum to the Dead Sea is lowest point on earth at 420m below sea level. The water is so salty it’s like oil; you don’t swim but float, strange.
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Dead-Sea.jpg)
Dead Sea, 50km long and 15km wide is dropping about a meter a year due to water extraction
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Dead-Sea-Floating.jpg)
Dead Sea mud, washed off in the Dead Sea, is good for the skin?
![](https://pamnjeff.com/jordan/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Jordan-Wine.jpg)
Our first wine for a week, a Jordanian Sauvignon Blanc tasted good