Tuesday 30 June 2009
Photo - Wadi Rum, Jordan.
Our second night camping in Wadi Rum, an amazing sunset & shooting stars to follow.
Monday 29 June 2009
Shipping to India.
After saying our very teary goodbyes to what we hope will be life long friends, the Jelinski's, we are back in Amman & getting no more used to navigating our way around this city of one way streets, numerous intersections and hills, somehow we manage to get to our destination, a little later than intended I admit & some heated words between ourselves, it makes the finding of what we are looking for all the more rewarding.
This morning we met Yousef at the Global Freight services offices in order to organise the paperwork to ship the car to India. When Gary spoke to Yousef previously he had forgotten to ask exactly what day it would be put in the container, we had been told 1st July by the company we had spoken to before. So with this in mind we assumed we would just be sorting out the paperwork, but no Yousef was ready for the car to go there and then. Well we hadn't organised our bags we still had loads of food in the fridge & Gary wanted to service the car before we got to India. Yousef is such a pleasant guy & was quite happy for us to go at 9am the next day to watch the car be put in the container and driven back down to Aqaba, for some reason it worked out £100 cheaper if we delivered the car to Amman & they drove it the 4 hours back to the port in Aqaba, fine by us as we have to fly out of Amman anyway.
The last few hours have been spent preparing to be without our car for the next 20 days, this is going to be quite a shock for us as we always have everything you need straight to hand but a change will do us good & keep us on our toes. The last three weeks traveling with the Jelinski's have been such a fantastic time, it really is amazing how you can click with total strangers & feel completely natural with them, they have become like family to us & have a place in our hearts.
This morning we met Yousef at the Global Freight services offices in order to organise the paperwork to ship the car to India. When Gary spoke to Yousef previously he had forgotten to ask exactly what day it would be put in the container, we had been told 1st July by the company we had spoken to before. So with this in mind we assumed we would just be sorting out the paperwork, but no Yousef was ready for the car to go there and then. Well we hadn't organised our bags we still had loads of food in the fridge & Gary wanted to service the car before we got to India. Yousef is such a pleasant guy & was quite happy for us to go at 9am the next day to watch the car be put in the container and driven back down to Aqaba, for some reason it worked out £100 cheaper if we delivered the car to Amman & they drove it the 4 hours back to the port in Aqaba, fine by us as we have to fly out of Amman anyway.
The last few hours have been spent preparing to be without our car for the next 20 days, this is going to be quite a shock for us as we always have everything you need straight to hand but a change will do us good & keep us on our toes. The last three weeks traveling with the Jelinski's have been such a fantastic time, it really is amazing how you can click with total strangers & feel completely natural with them, they have become like family to us & have a place in our hearts.
Sunday 28 June 2009
Photo - Amman, Jordan.
Our little friend, we don't know his name as he was deaf, the most expressionate little fella who captured our hearts.
Saturday 27 June 2009
Photo- The treasury, Jordan.
The treasury from above, well worth the hike & also great fun shouting at the tourist's below.
Photo- Bedouin garden village. Aqaba, Jordan
Me using the free wi-fi to catch up with everyone & upload as many photo's as possible to the blog.
Hi all, Gary has gone on a mission to sort out his bank card which the A.T.M machine swallowed up yesterday & also to get some parts for the car so he can do a service. I am taking this oppotunity to catch up with everyone on skype & to also upload as many photo's & video footage as possible.
We will be online for the next couple of days so if anyone would like to download skype & skype us it would be great to speak to you all & see you if you have a webcam.
We will be online for the next couple of days so if anyone would like to download skype & skype us it would be great to speak to you all & see you if you have a webcam.
Friday 26 June 2009
Thursday 25 June 2009
Comments
Thanks for all.. really, we have to stop and pinch ourselves from time to time. This planet is amazing.
Looks like we are off to India on the 1st July. Found a ship and a container for $200 US!! That's only the shipping not the port fees and handling but pretty cheap huh? Trying to find passage on a ship ourselves but it's proving hard.
Looks like we are off to India on the 1st July. Found a ship and a container for $200 US!! That's only the shipping not the port fees and handling but pretty cheap huh? Trying to find passage on a ship ourselves but it's proving hard.
Wednesday 24 June 2009
Still Jordan..
Wadi Rum, hard to beat Petra but here I am sat in the car under the shade of 400 meter cliffs having had lunch and in front of me is a martian landscape with 7 camels looking at me! It's a protected area (reserve) and you pay 2jd (£2) to get in and then the road runs out!.. Yeehaaa real off-roading, not just driving down a track to find a place to kip but actually having to use low range and let the tyres way down to get across multi colourd sand dunes. It's been a real bonus having the Jelinskis (great French name!?) with us as it's meant we can explore alot more in the comfort that we can help each other out if needs be (so far, touch wood, we've both managed to extricate ourselves from sticky situations). You can pretty much camp where you want and we've had the foresight to always camp at the base of a cliff that faces west so that in the morning you get shade from the rising sun and you can lie a little bit. The silence at night is a treat, no Immams wailing their lungs off out here!! ha ha. And of course the stars have been something else, we've seen shooting stars every night (etoile filante for Claudia and Charlotte!!). There is a lot of sites to see in Wadi Rum (rock bridges etc) but just driving around is a sight in itself, stunning.
Photo's to follow!!
Photo's to follow!!
Petra
Go there... honestly, if you can, go there. Along with Cappadocia in Turkey this is one place we really think is a "must see". On fantastic advice from John and Linda, we arrived at the entry at 0600hrs and walked the 1200m down the Siq which is a fissure in the rock created by plate movements, in fact this is really the start of the great rift valley that cuts right down into Africa. Amazed by the Siq and it's sheer sides only 3m apart in places, you emerge into a clearing to be stunned into silence not to mention goose bumps, by the Treasury. Wow bloody wow. But that's not it! It goes on and on and on. We bought two day tickets but three or possibly four would be needed to see all the site. I hope the pictures do it justice, just the colours in the rock were amazing let alone the carving. 20,000 Nabataen people aparently lived here 2000 ish years ago but of all the buildings discovered so far hardly any have been residential, largely because the Nabataens were nomads and lived in tents but boy could they carve rock!
More changes
Right, we're not going to Saudi Arabia. The steering wheel is on the wrong side.... No really... I'm not kidding. That and the fact the that we don't have a visa for The United Arab Emirates, which we don't need. Picture me expalining it's not neccessary for a British citizen to require a visa for UAE, "yes" the Saudi gentlemen says "but you still don't have one and it's not possible to cross Saudi without a visa for the next country" "yes" say I "but we don't require one" etc etc etc... very Python-esque. Anyhow, it's good it means we now know what we are doing.. shipping from Jordan.
First stop as I think I mentioned was the Dead sea. I must mention a little more about it. Honestly I thought I may be a little dissapointed, I thought perhaps it wouldn't be a whole lot different to being in a normal sea with a wetsuit on (which affords significant buoyancy). I was wrong! It's totally mad! You can stand upright out of your depth with your hands on your head and completely relax and the water won't even reach your chin! We'd did discover a couple of other things aswell a, a womans bottom has more bouancy than a mans (Kym and Rachel couldn't comfortably float in a sitting position without gradually turning over) and b, if you have even the tiniest cut, graze or scratched mosquito bite, the Dead Sea will let you know exactly where it is (as was evident when Igor ran screaming from the water like a little girl to the nearest shower after putting only his scratched ankles in the sea!). It was bloody hot at the lowest place on Earth though, 42c in the shade at one point and the wind through the car windows was like a hairdrier.
After a day and night below sea level we headed further South along the valley until we came to the turn off for Petra where we turned left and drove straight up the side of a mountain. Two stops on the way up to let the water cool down (I wasn't the only one, regular pull-over places on the one lane track had cars doing the same!) and we brached the pass and arrived at Wadi Musa the town that looks after Petra.
First stop as I think I mentioned was the Dead sea. I must mention a little more about it. Honestly I thought I may be a little dissapointed, I thought perhaps it wouldn't be a whole lot different to being in a normal sea with a wetsuit on (which affords significant buoyancy). I was wrong! It's totally mad! You can stand upright out of your depth with your hands on your head and completely relax and the water won't even reach your chin! We'd did discover a couple of other things aswell a, a womans bottom has more bouancy than a mans (Kym and Rachel couldn't comfortably float in a sitting position without gradually turning over) and b, if you have even the tiniest cut, graze or scratched mosquito bite, the Dead Sea will let you know exactly where it is (as was evident when Igor ran screaming from the water like a little girl to the nearest shower after putting only his scratched ankles in the sea!). It was bloody hot at the lowest place on Earth though, 42c in the shade at one point and the wind through the car windows was like a hairdrier.
After a day and night below sea level we headed further South along the valley until we came to the turn off for Petra where we turned left and drove straight up the side of a mountain. Two stops on the way up to let the water cool down (I wasn't the only one, regular pull-over places on the one lane track had cars doing the same!) and we brached the pass and arrived at Wadi Musa the town that looks after Petra.
Thursday 18 June 2009
40!
We've been travelling with a Family of frenchies recently. It's been nice to have company and also take the strain off having to make decisions all the time; And what a great family. Igor (eegor) the Dad, Rachel (rashel) the Mum, Sarah (saaraa) the oldest, Charles (sharle) the middle and Eleona the littlest and the only one that pronounces her name correctly!
They're on a mad 2 year round the world mission in a Land rover with two roof tents on the top and some pretty amazing organisational skills! They certainly made my birthday a couple of days ago a much more memorable occasion not only because of the Dorset muesli and Cuban cigar but as much for just being with us. Kym had a hard time trying to make it something special but as usual succeeded. Spent the day variously floating in Dead sea, swimming in the pool reading book (in Hammock) and enjoying a fantastic meal overlooking the Dead sea and tctcbn while the sun went down with a bottle of viognier and a fat cigar, oh and of course wearing my new birthday pants!!
They're on a mad 2 year round the world mission in a Land rover with two roof tents on the top and some pretty amazing organisational skills! They certainly made my birthday a couple of days ago a much more memorable occasion not only because of the Dorset muesli and Cuban cigar but as much for just being with us. Kym had a hard time trying to make it something special but as usual succeeded. Spent the day variously floating in Dead sea, swimming in the pool reading book (in Hammock) and enjoying a fantastic meal overlooking the Dead sea and tctcbn while the sun went down with a bottle of viognier and a fat cigar, oh and of course wearing my new birthday pants!!
So Jordan or the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan to give it it's proper name. Kind of stuck between Iraq and a hard place (sorry couldn't resist), but no really it is and the old King gets points for managing to walk the line pretty well in his time. Good trade links with the moustachiode mad man and tying his hardest to convince the Palestinians living in Jordan to talk to the country that cannot be named (here-after known as tctcbn) and vice-versa. In the meantime he had to deal with the fact that Jordans water is running out and they ain't got no oil, oh and since the mmm got hung and his country invaded, alot of people from Iraq aswell as the Palestinian refugies. The good news is that alot of the people fleeing the mmm and invasion we're rich and brought with them a great deal of money the people fleeing the tanks of tctcbn unfortunately do not have much money atall. So his son King Abdula seems to be stepping the same line but seems to be inviting a fair bit of investment here aswell. So there you go. As for the Jordanians, well so far you couldn't wish to meet a nicer bunch of people. First question is generally "where are you from?" followed by "welcome to Jordan" and the offer of tea or coffee. Even a traffic warden in Amman who had let us illegally park for an hour (without telling us first) explained to us when we returned that we shouldn't park here and would we like some water or a coca cola!! Time for some work exchange programmes I reckon.
Saturday 13 June 2009
Thanks.
Thanks to those of you who are taking the time to leave comments they really lift our spirits so please keep them coming.
Wednesday 10 June 2009
Surprise
Next day threw up a very unexpected but extremely welcome suprise..... SURF!!! Only small but great fun then later in the day our first glimpse of Crac De Chevalier the crusader castle that's appeared in so many movies. Camped outside and went in in the morning and it didn't dissapoint. Later East in to the desert to Palmyra, I'll let the photo's do the talking, wow.
Then back to Damascus which was so hot poluted and busy we quickly beat it to Bosra where we had the fantastic fortune to bump into John and Linda and their 5 star luxury motorhome complete with bathroom, dishwasher and great hospitality which thank goodness Kym managed to repay with a haircut. Thankyou guys. On to the Jordanian border which was a breeze.
Then back to Damascus which was so hot poluted and busy we quickly beat it to Bosra where we had the fantastic fortune to bump into John and Linda and their 5 star luxury motorhome complete with bathroom, dishwasher and great hospitality which thank goodness Kym managed to repay with a haircut. Thankyou guys. On to the Jordanian border which was a breeze.
Syria. A little trouble
South West to the beach which we got to too late at night and couldn't find access to, eventually a track looked to be heading the right direction so we headed down it only to be thwarted by a chain across the path and a very noisy person running flat out towards us with a bloody machine gun!! I swear he couldn't have been any more than 15. I very quickly killed the engine and the lights and shon the torch in our faces shouting "we're English!" God knows how many red bulls he'd had but he was not a happy bunny and kept screaming at us and of course pointing the gun at Kym who he thought was driving (steering wheels on the right in our car). At last reinforcements came who were obviously in their late teens and far more grown up, Kym politely asked if they could tell the jack russel with the gun to stop pointing it at us and they did. El' Capitan eventually shows up and thank goodness someone who was a little older 20 at a guess and we reckon on his 10th red bull or he's got friends from Bolivia. He gave us permission to leave and we gratefully got the hell outta dodge!!! Proper scary, freaked us both out and not something we want to happen again so definitely finding campsites before dark from now on.
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