Around The World in 64 Days: Into Jordan

Today is a travel day; leaving Israel and entering its’ eastern neighbor, Jordan. The original plan after much pre-trip research and study was to take an “Egged bus”, a tour-type comfortable bus from Tel Aviv to Eilat, the point of crossing the border. When we started talking to the Israeli locals we got all sorts of responses to our plan ... everything from “great idea, it’s a beautiful drive, and only $11” to “you’re crazy, only drug addicts take the bus and you’ll probably get robbed”. The only other options were (a) pay $600 for a taxi, or (b) take a small commuter plane for $300 to an airport nearby, then a 30-minute taxi ride. The time factor was about the same…5 hours bus or taxi versus about the same if flying by the time we dealt with check-in, security, etc. Bill made the executive decision to take the bus. Buses left hourly from the central bus station, but the border closed at 3:30pm so to make that, we had to catch the 8:00 am version. The ticket purchase procedure was online but the site was only in Hebrew so we solicited the help of the hotel front desk to transact the deal in hopes that they did not send us off to Syria by mistake. So, up at 5:30am and walking into the terminal at 7:15 am. Admittedly, the place was very old and pretty seedy and particularly in early morning…the winos and addicts were just waking up. But, once inside and with tickets in hand and bus gate found, Bill was beginning to feel like the hero.

The bus station and bus..not so bad after all!

Just a soldier, toting a gun, eating an ice cream.

Border crossing... we made it!

The ride WAS great and beautiful! Very comfortable, free WIFI onboard and two potty stops along the way and then presto, we are in Eilat, Israel … the southernmost city. A short taxi ride to the border crossing and we are ready to leave. Lots of bureaucracy here. First, we must officially leave Israel. Pay the exit fee, surrender the entrance pass, present passports, pictures, questions, etc. Then, step into Jordan and go through everything again, including a search for the drones that they are sure we are trying to bring with us. However, the Jordanians are very friendly with lots of smiles and seem genuinely glad that we are coming into their country. Another taxi ride with a jovial driver that does his best to sell us a tour and we finally arrive the Hilton Doubletree in Aqaba Jordan, our base for the next two nights. Bill booked a “grand suite” for no more than the cost of a nice Day’s Inn in the U.S, but we walk into the biggest suite we’ve ever seen…probably 1,200 square feet and an unbelievable view of the mountains. This is our first exposure to the fact that Jordan is MUCH cheaper that Israel.

We have several to-do’s so we hit the street. Breakfast is not included so we see a bakery right across the street. When we enter this place, we are treated like royalty. The sweating owner comes out and gives us a personal tour of the place, giving us samples along the way and introducing us to all his workers. Of course, the place is as hot as hell since the ovens are on and baking 24-hours a day and it’s 103 degrees outside. Anyway, we leave with a sack full of freshly baked goods for about $2 and everyone waving goodbye.

View of the Red Sea from our hotel

Bill's new buddy at the bakery

Bought a SIMM for Andrea’s phone for $20 for the ten days we’ll be in the country, and lined up a scuba dive for the next day at a very friendly dive shop just around the corner from the hotel. Outstanding Jordanian meal and wine nearby at the Ali Baba Restaurant and an early bedtime after a long but fascinating and successful day.

At 10am we appear at the Aqaba International Dive Center and are meet at the counter by Willy, a senior student at Middlebury College in Vermont who is on a work-study program here. His areas of study: major in Arabic and minor in math. Cool guy, completely fluent in Arabic and one of our dive masters for the day. The other fellow is a nice young Jordanian with an indecipherable name who said to just call him “seahorse”. We did two dives, each about one hour in length but not too much depth. We are certified to sixty feet, but not needed today. The first dive was to a sunken ship, the “Cedar Pride”, a Jordanian ship sunk in the 80's to create a reef. We’ve dove other sunken ships and it’s a very weird and interesting dive to swim around these massive structures. The second dive was to a reef area. We’ve seen prettier, but it was nice and we got to swim with a massive turtle along the way. There was only one other diver with us besides the two masters…a sweet German eighteen-year-old girl, Maja, on holiday with her father (who was back at the hotel working).

Sunken ship, the Cedar Pride