"A" is for Amman and Aqaba. We visited both cities during our stay in Jordan, but we used them as bases for exploring the surrounding area, rather than destinations in themselves. Whilst we didn't get to know them intimately, the short time we were there gave us a taste of their vibe and what they have to offer.

Amman is a chaotic miasma of sidewalk markets, people shouting, green glowing minarets and crazy taxis. The general hustle and bustle is exciting, but it can be overwhelming. Most of our interaction with Amman came from walking the streets, sitting down to eat and people-watching. A lunch of hommous, bean dip, flat bread, falafel, tomato, mint and onion filled our bellies while we observed the chattering locals. The trademark infringing and pirated goods that filled the markets kept us entertained. Some fantastic blueberry thickshakes complimented a view of the haphazard night skyline. Honking taxi drivers had us repeatedly turning around mid stride.

About 70km away from Amman is Jerash, a town sheltering some magnificent Roman ruins. A group of us from Abassi Palace Hotel bartered our way there by taxi and minibus. As we walked around the archaeological site, a sandstorm set in, making for some very dramatic photos. In the Roman amphitheatre an Arab guy played an American song on Scottish bagpipes. Quite the culture mix. More bartering over the price of lunch, then back to the ruins for a chariot show put on by the locals. Bluey got a ride in a poorly maintained chariot. Finally, after more bartering with a local cop who became our impromptu taxi driver, we made it home.

An entire day was wasted attempting to hire a car. We wanted to drive down the Dead Sea Highway, stop at the Dead Sea, then continue through Wadi Mujib to the Kings' Highway, which leads to Wadi Musa (the town close to Petra). Every car hire place in Amman seemed to be out of cars, have a minimum hire period of three days, be ridiculously expensive or be fiendishly difficult to contact. Efficiency and organisation aren't Jordanians' strongest virtues.

After realising the futility of organising to drive ourselves to Wadi Musa, we minibussed instead. From Wadi Musa, after two excellent visits to Petra, we minibussed again to Aqaba. Aqaba sits on the Red Sea, the entire waterfront taken up by hotels with tens of storeys. You can almost see the wads of cash brought in by tourists piling up in the cities banks. On arriving and dumping our stuff in the Nairoukh II Hotel, Aisha and I headed out to book the two things we came to do - diving in the Red Sea, and a hammam.

Arab Divers took us to two dive sites. I SCUBA dived while Aisha snorkelled the first site, "Gorgon II", named after the massive fan-like Gorgon coral that filled the view through our masks. Two coral bommies over 8m high were home to families of scorpion fish. A nudibranch, pufferfish and giant clam also made an appearance. Unfortunately, the dive was slightly spoiled by my leaking mask and BCD. I snorkelled the second site with Aisha, as our flight to Tel-Aviv was within 18 hours. The dive trail, known as "The Power Station", followed 400kV underwater electrical transmission lines to a steep drop off on the ocean floor. Snorkelling along the ridge was magical. We saw a spotted ray, schools of barracuda and clown fish against a stunning backdrop of coral.

A hammam (Turkish bath) in Jordan is much cheaper than one in Turkey, although probably not quite as extravagant. For 24 JOD, both of us sweltered in a steam room, got vigorously soaped and scrubbed from top to bottom, and then enjoyed a full body massage and a cup of tea.

All of the paragraphs in this post begin with the letter "A".

Locations