Day 15 Exploring the Rose Red City

The Siq

What a luxury to have a second day in Petra! We got up early to beat the crowd. Petra was the capital city for the Nabateans. When the Romans came, they built the limestone pavement because the sandstone mountains in Petra would not sustain the weight of the Roman chariots. We walked through the Siq admiring the soaring cliffs around us. The pass way was so narrow and the cliffs were so high, there was only a skinny line to peek into the blue morning sky. After thousands of years of wind and sand erosion, the rocks had the most amazing colors. The base was always the famous pinkish red and there were charcoal black, bright yellow, brown, and even blue markings on top.

The oil painting colors of the rock is truly incredible!

About 40 minutes of meandering through the Siq, it opened up again to the red facade of the Treasury. On the right, the road continued to the Monastery, the highest point of Petra. 850 steps and we did it! Julee was doing great with just one arm balancing on the rocky steps. Unlike the Treasury that had Roman and Egyptian influence, the Monastery had plain and simple Nabatean design only. The giant columns and the facade of the grand tomb were chiseled out of the red sandstone mountain, nestling in the background of the blue sky and sandy land full of small yellow rocks and green wild tulips. It is beyond my words to describe.

Me in front of the Monastery carved inside the mountain.

After seeing a sign for "View", we continued from the Monastery up the mountain for another 10 minutes, following a dozen signs that showed us where the "VIEW" was until we got to the highest peak. It was really hard to miss the "View". At the top, there was a hut selling silver jewerlly and souvenirs. Alex bought a pair of Bedouin earings.

Monastery from the side, coming down from the "Socrifice (Sacrifice) View"

I bought a stone from a little Bedouin girl earlier on the way up and later found a couple more on the ground myself. All of them looked like a miniature rock that formed Petra and I will add them to my collection from Wadi Rum.

Every five minutes there would be a local Bedouin riding by, in a horse carriage, on horseback or a donkey. They would approach us and try very hard to sell us a ride. "Taxi? Taxi?" The guy yelled out from the donkey back and added "Free air-conditioning!" We laughed. I just love the sense of humor in all the people we met along the way. At the end of each day, there were always little moments like this that reminded me how fun loving the local people were.

The mountain goats were doing acrobatic moves on this tree, some eating leaves with one leg on the rock and the other three hanging to the branches. It was quite a sight.

Tomorrow we go to Madaba to see the first map of the Middle East made in mosaic and of course, the Dead Sea. I can't wait to float in it!