Eilat and Petra, Jordan

So with the debacle in Tel Aviv, I had an extra week in Israel. What. To. Do...

While it would have been tempting to spend a week indulging in drinking, social media and drawing, I decided to take the opportunity to visit Petra in Jordan. This turned out to be one of the best and worst decisions of my trip.

I made my way to Eilat, the closest crossing point into Jordan, where I spent a few days. Basically it's a resort beach town that has no cultural value, but great weather and a beach.  Think 'Only Fools and Horses-on-sea'. Great for guilt free sunbathing with cocktails.

The crossing to Jordan was just bizarre. We arrived early in the morning and there were still a lot of people there. I'm glad we had a guide as the process was confusing, I'm sure I could have muddled through, but it would have been tedious at best. There was one stop for leaving Israel (fine) then you went through duty free (weird) to get to the next stop to enter Jordan (OK) and then there was another stop for who only knows what? I still have no idea... There's a joke here about it being hard to get into Jordan and a certain glamour model, but we're not going to go
There...

I made friends on the bus with a couple of English girls, as well as Dariela, a Mexican living in Pheonix and her mother Yolanda who would prove to be my saviours later on.

We all got to the Petra site and wow! You can easily see why it's one of the seven wonders of the world. I'm not sure which specific aspect won it the accolade, but man, before you even get to the buildings you're already blown away.

The reddy-orange sandstone is lined with differing colours from mineral compounds, which tower above you. I stood there in awe as I saw the rock undulating in waves created by water erosion, the sun coming down in beams as it reached through the canopy of sandstone created by the jutting strata above. It's like another world. 

We walked past smaller settlements carved into the rock as we approached the main event for our tour. The tomb, which appeared in Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade. You approach it in the same way as they do in the film. The rock giving high up glimpses of the structure before you come out of the canyon to see it in all its glory. It's amazing, the workmanship, the scale and the preservation are mind blowing... The latter was certainly appreciated after being in Cairo. 

The guide gave us a lot of history and detail on the building. It is an ecumenical tomb of sorts with depictions from all the current religions of the time to help the interred reach heaven. It also bears motifs relating to the seven days of the week and the 12 months and the 365 days of the year. There's tonnes more, but this is my blog not Wikipedia. The last factoid I'll leave you is that the third column from the left was replaced in the 20th century and its the only one that's slightly wonky... Face... Palm...

The guide also told us that there's a much more impressive building further into the complex, but that we wouldn't have time to see it. From the picture he showed us, it makes what I saw seem like a security hut outside of Buckingham Palace! This news was a bit gutting.

We ambled into an amphitheater where the complex opened up to reveal a huge number of impressive buildings. Some of us went off to explore and saw an amazing building which we could walk into and look around. The colours of the rock were really impressive and as well as the size. I couldn't get over how they had created these rooms without any cave ins. They clearly had a huge amount of knowledge working with the stone. Dariela and I also met Sereena.

Sereena is a Jordanian teenager with an infectious smile who approached us in a cherry, confident manner that completely disabled my 'no I don't want any' auto-response. She politely explained that she was on a mission to make people smile and handed Dariela and I cards which said 'free smiles will change the world' and explained her plan on the back. We took a quick photo, swapped Instagram details and then she was on her way leaving us both smiling - mission success I think. I have to say I'm really impressed with her, what a brilliant young woman! I hope and believe she will change the world and I wish her every luck in doing so.

So that was the good bit...

Then comes the really rough part! Forty-five minutes of being interrogate by Israeli border police resulting in a missed ride to my hostel. I'm not going to go into it on here, but there's a perfectly good rant to watch on my vid below.

I was relieved to be out of immigration, but the whole experience had left me at a really low point, so very far from all the people who love and support me. That's the hardest part of what I'm doing, when things get tough you're on your own, you can't just chat to your mum or get a hug from a friend, you can't just have a stress drink with someone and forget about it. Or so I thought..

My saviours Dariela and Yolanda proved to be brilliant friends as they messaged me immediately and took me out for dinner and drinks. They even came to my hostel to collect me. They really are such excellent people and I count myself very lucky to have met them. I hope to meet up with State-side!

That was pretty much it. I spent time on the beach in Eilat, met a cool guy called Nathan who I shared a room with and went back to Tel Aviv, where I got a private operatic recital from Omrea and Filippo - clips in the vid. Check it out, it's very impressive. There were also cuddles and licks from the pooch.

So that's it. Next stop India! Please do comment and share. Plus visit my YouTube page and subscribe. I'm not doing any of this to be Internet famous, but six subscribers on YouTube is pitiful haha.