Petra

A drizzly morning greeted us as we awoke Tuesday morning for our first and only full day in Wadi Musa, the town bordering the historic city of Petra. Our spirits were lifted, however, after we consumed a hearty hotel breakfast and departed to the site beneath clearing skies around 7:30 that morning.

We found the visitor center bustling with both tourists and trinket-toting vendors, and decided to bypass these hordes to head directly for the park entrance. This opens to a gently winding dirt road that slopes downward into the canyon, bordered in several places by a variety of small historic structures and monuments. These rock hewn edifices give the unsuspecting visitor his first taste of the marvels to come.

A little over three quarters of a mile down this path is the entrance to the iconic Siq canyon, the narrow mountain gorge that leads to Petra. Formed by a natural split in the mountain smoothed by the flow of water, this path winds on for yet another three quarters of a mile, varying in width so that we found ourselves walking through narrow passages roughly 10 feet across to those several times wider, arranged periodically along the route. Most of the path in the canyon is roughly paved, with some sections containing reproductions of the original large cobblestones.

The last bit of the canyon forgoes these niceties in favor of a simple dirt surface, whose arrival heralds the nearness to the gorge's end. Here we got our first glimpse of the famous Treasury (Al-Khazneh in Arabic), the elaborately carved and colonnaded facade that is synonymous with Petra. The sight of this impressive edifice peeping through the undulating walls momentarily halted our progress, as we all stopped to ponder the civilization that created these ruins.

These industrious ancients are known as the Nabataeans, a race of nomadic Arabs who took this city as their capital around 300 BC (it had already been settled for perhaps almost 9000 years). The city's proximity to local trading routes made these people wealthy, and thereby increased its own grandeur and sophistication. Throughout the city are traces of water channels and cisterns which suggest a formerly lush landscape amid the arid desert.

Exiting the Siq brings travelers to a canyon running perpendicularly to this narrow gorge; the Treasury faces the opening with the route to the rest of the city branching out to the right. To the left the canyon shortly ends, although a path guarded by baksheesh-seeking guides snakes higher up into the canyon walls to afford visitors a superior view of the Treasury.

The right side route is called the Outer Siq; bordering this path is a large amphitheater carved into the slopes to the South with many elaborately facaded tombs engraved into the mountainside to the North. A large road heads from this route out into a wide valley lined with ruins and ending with yet another gorge between mountains in the West. A narrow path runs up and through this gorge for almost a mile to the famous Monastery, a rock hewn edifice similar to the Treasury in design but surpassing this monument in size.

Besides this general route are many smaller paths which snake up and down mountainsides and wind over the many hills of the valley, taking the plodding traveler to a myriad other monuments and rock hewn caves that are scattered over the city.

We began our first foray into this sprawling complex by taking one of these paths up into the mountains to the South of the Outer Siq. This route brought us up a great many steps to what is called the Place of High Sacrifice, which, as the reader may gather, occupies a rocky pinnacle commanding a panoramic view of the valley. A ruined structure and alter adorn this peak, which in ancient times was used as a place for arcane rituals.

Descending down the opposite side, away from the Outer Siq, brought us down more steps and treacherously winding paths which passed a variety of other ancient structures. These included a relief of a lion carved into the stone, whose mouth formerly spouted water, several spacious tombs, and an old garden with traces of water channels and cisterns.

Everywhere along this route (and indeed over most of the park) are old edifices and caves carved into the mountainsides. Some of these have nicely decorated facades, but the majority are unadorned, causing the observer to wonder whether the bulk of these cavities are the result of natural processes or the industry of man.

At any rate, today many of these caverns are inhabited by native goat herders, whose flocks we noticed grazing on the hills and mountainsides of the valley. Some of these troglodytes venture forth daily to sell hot tea and trinkets to the many tourists visiting the city; their sorry looking shacks of fabric and corrugated metal sheeting flank all of the paths near key points of interest so that visitors must frequently endure gauntlets of aggressive vendors nearly wherever they go.

Our path after reaching the valley floor took us West towards the mountains containing the route to the Monastery. Losing the barely marked trail, we found ourselves scrambling through what looked to be a dried up river bed that brought us up nearly to the feet of these towering cliffs, some ways South of the Monastery path. Dotting these cliffs is a cluster of tombs collectively called the Columbarium; to the North overlooking the main route in Petra is a small mountain whose summit is crowned by the ruins of an old Crusader castle itself built over a former Nabataean fortress.

Heading North we took the winding path up to these ruins; this mountaintop fortress proved reminiscent of the formidable Pog but with a more treacherous ascent and an even more precarious pinnacle, whose small windswept surface and steep sides almost invite the weary climber to cast himself into the bordering abyss. At the base of the upper levels of the fortress we enjoyed a simple lunch and panoramic view of the valley looking East towards the Outer Siq. Here we observed bustling crowds of tourists visiting the distant tombs across the valley and winding their way through the main route towards the Monastery gorge (behind us to our left as we sat). Upon leaving the main route to climb to the Place of High Sacrifice we had left these hordes, and were almost surprised to see the multitudes that wandered around on the valley floor like ants.

Descending from the castle ruins we rejoined the crowds and headed East towards the Monastery, making a slight detour to see several more rock hewn tombs. This route brought us weary travelers up a myriad of steps and slopes past more vendors and vistas, until finally reaching an opening in the valley with the Monastery carved into one cliff face. The stately aspect and imposing size of this edifice, whose style closely matches that of the Treasury, greatly impressed all of our party, especially as its appearance came as a surprise to all. Indeed, as we were not expecting another, grander copy of the Treasury, suddenly coming upon the Monastery was similar to finding another Parthenon on the Acropolis or a new Colosseum in Rome.

We reached the westward extant of our journey by venturing somewhat further to an adjacent pinnacle for yet another panoramic view of the surrounding mountains, which are all part of the Jordan Rift Valley.

The sun being well into its early descent, we decided to head straight back to the Siq, taking the main route on the valley floor which we had passed circuitously to the South on the former part of our journey. This path brought us past some of the main ruins of the park, including the famous Qasr al-Bint temple complex, the dry and crumbling Nabataean Baths, and the colonnaded Great Temple, which in its former glory was surrounded by verdant moats and channels.

All quite exhausted from a long days wanderings, we enjoyed a real beer from the bar in our hotel before venturing to an neighboring restaurant for another authentic meal, where among the delicacies enjoyed was camel.


-Theodore

 

Outside the main gate; the rain clouds dissipated and did not return 

 

Entering the Siq

 

First glimpse of the Treasury 

 Tut, Mummy, and Tut in front of the Treasury

 

First steps up to the Place of High Sacrifice

View from the path

 

Tut and Tut at the Place of High Sacrifice, with the valley below

 The Place of High Sacrifice

 

The carved lion, observe the channel through which water once flowed out of the (now missing) lion's mouth

 

Many carved caves speckle the landscape

 

More caves

 

Detail of richly colored bands on a rock wall, such patterns were evident all over the site

 

Path leading up to the old fortress, note the precarious bridge 

 Commanding view from the old fortress; the Siq opening is the darker portion of the mountains near the center of the frame.

 

Lunch amidst the rubble of the crusader castle

 

A pair of goats wandering among the rocks

 

The Monastery, similar to the Treasury, but impressively larger

 

Dinner. The camel dish is to the right; through the spices it is indistinguishable from beef (but pretty tough)