So Petra was Beautiful! We woke up the next morning and looked out our window into an amazing canyon. Very colorful and intricate. The kind that is difficult to capture on a camera (Though we tried really hard…).

We caught the 10am shuttle down to the entrance to the park and we slowly wound our way down through the narrow passageways of the canyon into the ancient city. The rock was even more beautiful up close. There were so many colors! Red, orange, yellow, black, blue, white, you get the picture… It was amazing and we were snapping pictures like the camera was going out of style! I think this was when we all realized that we would have many of the exact same pictures. I think I even got some shots of Sue taking shots of Amy taking shots of Kristie taking shots…

Anyway, it didn’t matter. Petra was gorgeous and we took hundreds of pictures! We walked down the canyon and signs of civilization slowly appeared. There were some tombs carved from stone. The irrigation system was carved into the rock and ran down along the side of the canyon. Then we started seeing carvings in the stone and a few small dug out caverns in the rock. The canyon walls got more narrow and then we rounded the corner and saw the famous treasury building. Beautiful, huge and ornate. It was just as seen in all the pictures, but even more amazing in person.

We continued past that building and saw so many more facades carved into the cliffs and canyon walls. It was really quite amazing and unbelievable as to how much work had been put into this canyon to make it home. Kristie and I also chuckled at the idea that you home was really as big and fancy as you wanted it to be. You just had to actually carve it out of the rock.

Anyway, we made it down to the monastery, another large facade and cavern carved and cut into the stone. We saw the forum/amphitheater, also carved out of the rock. There were steps carved everywhere leading up and out of the canyon. It was amazing!

So, after following the path down deep into the canyon we all decided that the time to take our obligatory camel ride had arrived. Kristie waved down a local Bedouin (the local nomads of the area) and he was very happy to secure 4 camels for our ride back to the treasury building.

I was lucky enough to get aboard Daisy, who didn’t really seem all that excited about me getting aboard, but she did a good job and didn’t fuss too much about the annoying tourist on her back.

After that we hiked the rest of the way out of the canyon, grabbed a bite to eat and did a little shopping before heading back to the hotel to unwind for dinner and prepare to make our journey to the Dead Sea!