JORDAN - an unexpected journey.
March 2014
An exploratory and unexpected photographic journey:
Departure from Milan.
4 photographers;
one night at the airport;
half-day spent in Frankfurt for the flight change;
an arrival in Amman in late nights
1 rental car.
The plan of our trip is this: sleeping in Madaba, moving to the desert of Wadi Rum (in the car are about 3/4 hours); then stop in the ever-present Petra; Dead Sea and back ... with all the various stops of the case.
Yes, because the beauty of a photographic journey is that there is always something for which it is worthwhile to nail the car and jump out to take a picture that can take from 2 minutes to a 1 hour stop.
Madaba is a quiet town. A busy and curious center. Shops in the streets of "shopping" are divided according to the goods sold, as often happens in these parts.
There is the market on the street .. which is always a great opportunity to meet people and browse without being noticed too much. But the stop is short because the journey to Wadi Rum is long.
We cross boundless roads and lost almost to nothing. Sbrulli landscapes where we meet only some small villages. A short stop for lunch and take the road again.
The change of landscape is noticeable when it comes to the gates of the desert.
The Wadi Rum is the desert that we all have imagination. It is a rocky desert and is located on the border with Saudi Arabia. Its name derives from water.
Wadi , in fact, means water; the water of the river that dug the rock creating this desert.
Rum, on the other hand, means "high" and refers to the heights in the area. The highest mountain Jebel Rum (1754 m).
At the entrance of the site (where you pay an entrance fee of € 5 each) you can admire the great 7 pillars of wisdom.
One of the most impressive and particular massifs of Wadi Rum.
I admit, for me this desert is fascinating for a particularity more than the other: it is a respectable destination for sport climbing .. one of my innumerable passions!
We meet our driver at the village and do the car change because only jeeps are allowed on the sand tracks.
For two wonderful nights our base will be the Teva Milky Way Beduin Camp , set up at the foot of large rocks and overlooking a red and panoramic plain from where we can enjoy the sunrise.
In the desert everything takes different rhythms. The hours are dictated only by light and there is no hurry. The night is incredibly dark and shows a magnificently starry sky. As soon as the day takes place in the shadows, the sun begins to heat these dry lands.
We spend these 2 days to discover a small part of this great desert and we lose ourselves with the spirit and the look beyond its borders .
Our guide is a young Bedouin. He tells me that for nothing in the world would leave his desert .. because he is free and he lacks nothing. He lives with his family and works with tourists. And it will not be the only one to reveal the pleasure of living in complete freedom in these lands marked by time.
The night is a swarm of stars.
After 2 nights, we leave our tents and the camp boys reluctantly. We take back our car and get on the road to the magical and agitated Petra.
It's from the days of Indiana Jones that I dream of walking along the mysterious Siq and relive some film adventure ... But here we are in reality and the arrival in the city looks a little different from the Holliwoodiana idea.
Obviously the tourist activities are king in this corner of the world and everything revolves around the great historical sites. Our first stop is the site of "Little Petra" .
A village carved into the rock, just like the "original" Petra; less important but not for this less fascinating.
The little tourism that passes through it perhaps makes this place even richer in mystery; and while we wander among the temples and the ancient dwellings and caves of the Bedouins, we come out on a natural rock terrace overlooking a great valley that seems to really come out of a movie!
Here we meet Atallah, who is alone in this desert of rocks and infinite peace, with its local craftsmanship and its flute , which sweetly resonates in the valley and makes this moment magical.
I approach him and with the excuse that I delight in the music, I start to tell something about him. He tells me he is a Bedouin and until the 1980s he lived like everyone else, with his family, in caves carved into the rock. Made friends, he points me a path up the rock where he gives me the best view you can imagine ... so we climb together to the top.
Once at the top, the spectacle of the valley opens up before our eyes and we can only thank him for showing us the way.
We stop again to talk to him and again his flute resounds throughout the valley.
It's late; it's time to get off and go back to the city for dinner.
Petra awaits us ... and our meeting will take place in its most unusual form: at night.
Traveling the Siq for the first time at night is an emotion that I can not describe. Darkness is understood as silence. Looking up, where the high walls give way to the sky, you see a blue strip covered with endless stars. The path is strewn with candles ... and everything takes on an air so magical that it might seem like a dream!
The route runs for 1.6 km and suddenly you enter the show!
In front of me, the treasure of Petra incredibly lit by an expanse of candles ...
Unfortunately we have to leave this dream stage and return to the airport for the return to Italy. On the way we stop for a stop on the great Dead Sea. I must say that I expected it to be very different and it is certainly worth taking a detour to study the large boulders that crowd the banks, both for a refreshing bath!
So our journey ends. With the promise of returning to this country to continue the journey to the destinations that we could not reach .. and to get lost again in these timeless landscapes and in the deepest eyes of this sympathetic and hospitable people, not too far from our life!
