Petra II
On our second day in Petra we hiked to the far end of the area and up a long trail to an incredibly large carving called the Monastery (note the people at the bottom for scale – yes, they are very hard to see, like little ants, or people from far away). Apparently priests would hike up to this building carved into the hillside for some religious ceremony or another. Of course, the area was abandoned more than 1,500 years ago, about the time Europe was entering the Dark Ages, so take that with a grain of salt.
This trail had no shade and took us about an hour to reach the top once we started climbing. Just 5 minutes past the Monastery was a stunning overlook. Our pictures didn’t do it justice, but we did have a delicious lunch of Laughing Cow cheese, fresh pita, and carrots. And Tang.
Opposite the Monastery was a little tent selling souvenirs, water and tea, and food. On the way down we saw how they got all the water up the mountain. These bastards (the donkeys, not the drivers), which also carried tourists up, left plenty of stinky trail markers.
The Grand Temple, back at the main city center, had a hexagonal pattern floor, which, for whatever reason, I became obsessed with. So here is a picture of me standing on it. And below it an overview photo of the Grand Temple.
Next to the temple were some excavation sites. It was incredibly exciting to see how the archeologists, presumably from Brown University, dug rectangular pits looking for ruins. All those 7th grade social studies fantasies were staring me in the face.
In Petra there is a 6th century church, which I believe is Byzantine, which had some beautiful mosaics. The camel and leopard (?) were just two of about 50 mosaics that ringed the inside of the church.
A 7000 seat amphitheatre was carved into the cliffs in the 1st century AD by the Nabataeans. Rumor has it that Andrew Lloyd Weber learned his trade under Nabataean masters 2000 years ago and he has been wandering the desert in search of inspiration for the interim, apparently without much luck. But that is just what I heard from a Bedouin who lived nearby…
-posted by Thrashin Badger
Tags: Travel, Tag Index
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