Visiting Shobak castle and the Petra museum
Shobak castle
The view is clearer this morning of the Dana valley through the windows. Probably because it's very cold outside. Alexis has gotten his, too-early, natural wake up time to good use and switched on the heater.
When the alarm clock rings, we can go about packing the bags and getting ready. Breakfast is a nice Arabic assortment and we meet the owner's son.
After a second round of hot tea and a little chat, we get going. It's about 9 am and we want to visit Shoback castle on the way to Petra.
We get through those huge wind mill plateau and I find the scenery with the huge cotton candy clouds around quite beautiful in its on way.
As we near the castle, the road is cut and we have to make a detour to get to the visitor center. Everything looks under renovation and we wonder if we can actually visit. Turns out yes, but all explanations have been removed, a good chunk is closed off with a team working on restorations.
We are the only tourists on site and we walk around enjoying the numerous archs that still stand, remnants of what were once roofs and tall ceilings. The castle has a good view over Shoback village and the little stone huts and rock carved houses. Hassan, our guide from yesterday, said that these houses are no longer used to live in, people having moved to more modern ones, but they use them for their cattle now.
In the castle, islamic carvings are still visible along one of the main tower and inside above a door. The towers are fairly well preserved and some sections have a succession of very narrow rooms.
With the lack of explanations, we visit ot fairly quickly. We know that it was a Frankish fort, then taken by the Ayyubid and latest the Mamelukes.
Petra is only 40mkn drive away and we arrive there by 11:30. Since we are not that hungry, we decide to visit the museum first and then try to put our hands on a map of Petra to plan the next few days of visit.
The museum is surprisingly rich in information about the Nabataean, but it's not necessarily on the boards or next to the exhibits, but inside all the touch screen TVs that are in the rooms. I am fairly certain most people just overlook them, but they hold detailed information about every main tombs, temples or structures that we will visit tomorrow. They also have fantastic drone views and little panoramic videos illustrating some of the topics.
Since I am unsure about the amount of content we will find in the site itself ( and we don't plan on hiring a guide ), it's worth spending the extra time browsing through these TVs.
We finish the visit a little before 1pm and walk to the visitor center. There we can find a paper map of the site with detailed information about the various trails and their walking time. Someone approaches us to ask of we need information ( an official tourism office person ). We ask some questions about little Petra and how to get from there to the Monastery. We can apparently take an official Jeep for JOD5 per person and then walk the trail back to the monastery. There is a free Shuttle that goes to little Petra starting from 7:30 am.
Towards the end, he tries to offer the service of an official guide, but we kindly decline. He doesn't insist. I do like this about Jordanians, they do try, which is fair, but they are not pushy and get rejection with elegance and a smile.
Not like in Egypt where it was really borderline harassment and I think I was insulted once for not answering the insane amount of solicitations.
We are a little tired, a flu is creeping in. We find one of the tourist restaurant and order a simple meal... which ends up costing an arm and a leg for really nothing special at all. In Amman, Mansaf was 6 to 7 JOD, in Wadi Musa it's 13 JOD.... And with the conversion between Euro and JOD today ( 1 JOD = 1.36 Euro ) an average meal ends up being almost 40 euros... Needless to say, staying at an Airbnb where you can cook your own meal or having a car to go eat at the local restaurants further away in town is a worthwhile decision.
We check in at our Airbnb, which is a huge place that I think we will be very comfortable in. We start a load of laundry and get some rest.
After a while we walk around to the few supermarkets around, get bread from the bakery and for not even half of what we paid for lunch, we have enough food for 4 meals.
The rest of the day is spend resting and planning the next 3 days visits in Petra. The site is huge !
And playing in my head tonight?
And if you haven't already : it's time to watch Indiana Jones and the last crusade.
Since I saw the movie when I was a kid, Petra has been on my top 10 of places to see in my life ! I can't wait for tomorrow.
