2018 Eastern Mediterranean Trip - Day 17, On To Jordan, Amman

Israel is so May 10. May 11 brings us to a new country, a new place for us to explore - Jordan.

Leaving Israel, the land of the begrudging hospitality industry, is of course not a piece of cake. When doing our planning, I had looked for an airport hotel that was close by and had a shuttle. While this is a common accommodation to find in the US, it is much, much rarer in most of the rest of the world that we have visited. I finally found a place on Booking that was fairly close and talked about having a two bedroom apartment. I looked briefly at the pictures of the place and sort of noted that it didn't look like a hotel.

I should have looked closer. It was basically an apartment that a family is renting out (I guess they are trying to do this as a business as they seemed to have a couple of others in a new construction of theirs). Turns out there is only one bedroom (the other being the living room with futon and no darkening shades. AND the apartment didn't have a stove or oven. We had food with us but no place to cook it. On top of that we were in this weird suburban enclave of very Orthodox Jews. The shuttle was going to be the husband driving us early in the morning. It was not going to be easy to drop off the car in the evening (tons of traffic), get back to this place, be isolated there and trust this guy to take us in the morning. I kept the rental car.

We had a really early flight and with the tense situation we figured security would be an issue. What we didn't account for was there were two car rental return locations and we needed to go to the one that was not well marked. This caused much navigation angst and driving around the huge airport. Then when we arrived nothing was particularly well marked for turning the car in. So that cost us time too. When we finally got to the terminal there was what looked like a very, very long line for initial screening. The Israeli system is to do individual screening of people before you check in for your plane. We were a little worried about the amount of time that was taking but once we were through the line at the airline (Royal Jordan) was short. The counter guy told us that there were only middle rows left but, no there was one window, middle combination left. We still had time change our money and grab a sandwich for breakfast. Once on the plane their proved to be lots of empty seats and we spread out to take our whole row so not sure what the gate agent was talking about.

The flight from Tel Aviv to Amman takes only 45 minutes so we were on the ground in Jordan by 9:15 AM. There were no other flights arriving at our time and we were toward the front of the plane so we whisked through passport control. Our driver, Ashram, was there waiting for us. This being our first time in Jordan, we decided that we didn't want to do the heavy lifting of figuring out all our logistics so we booked package that combined accommodations and a driver for the five days we're here. He's not a guide but basically a facilitator so we get to be on our own at the sites which suits us fine. And after all the driving stress in Israel, I'm glad to be taken care of for a few days. Tourism, a major driver of the Jordanian economy, has been week since the war in Syria broke out, so prices are very reasonable. We are basically paying $130 a day per person for the car and driver plus hotel room with breakfast and dinner included.

We went from the airport to a couple of the sites in town the cover the rich history Amman has. Then we checked into the hotel right after grabbing some takeout shawarma for lunch. We were both pretty beat so naps were in order. Then we went out to check out the neighborhood and get some water.  Dinner is going to be buffet's at the hotels were booked at so nothing to write about gastronomically.

Pictures

How Old is Amman?

The Citadel much like the sites in Israel has ruins from Roman and Byzantine times but also has them from the early Islamic period as well

Monumental Roman Reconstruction

Monumental Roman Sculpture arises from the dead to seek its revenge

Looking through the ruins of the Byzantine era baths to the site of the Umayyid Islamic ruins

Said Umayyid area ruins

Its great mosque

But not its real dome

A cistern for collecting and storing rain water

Triumphal Main Gate

There was a very good archaeological museum

Did you know that development of glass blowing technique in Roman times made glassware a common product available to all

And damn it, its Roman era, you have to have mosaics!

There are good vistas available from the Citadel

This mosque's decoration is more Egyptian than of the area

And by Jove we need more Roman Theaters!

 

Guys playing football in front of the Roman Theater

Our hotel

And right across the street

Where are these supermarkets when we have rentals!

Graffiti artists are decorating Amman like in Jerusalem

This is a huge wall painting at least 7 stories tall!

Haven't been able to figure out who it is yet.

Look at the detail on the mouth, mustache, and eyes

And his hands

No sidewalks or cross walks, getting to the Safeway was a bitch

Then we found this pedestrian bridge 

Getting there led us to our newest friends 

The staff of 911 Coffee

The guy in red flags down taxi drivers who give him an order for a coffee that he brings to the taller fellow who produces it. Delivered to the driver who drinks it in a couple of gulps who then is back to work.