Please, Madam, welcome! Ksar Al-Kharrana is the first desert castle you’ll meet on your way to Azraq, a hundred kilometres east from Amman.
Jordan is easy to visit if you start from its capital city. If you travel by car, we suggest you to have an excellent map as this sprawling town can make you wander round and about till you lose your head!
Moving to Azraq, you’ll have to follow the continuous line of very old and jolting lorries which go to supply Baghdad. Don’t be astonished if the road suddenly widens out: it becomes an aerodrome. Ksar Al-Kharrana is a big square castle built in 712 A.D. for Al-Walid I, a Umayyad caliph living in Damascus. Here he welcomed the chiefs of nomadic Bedouin tribes to make sure of their loyalty. Admission is free but don’t forget the jovial potbellied guide. Please, Madam, welcome! In the car park some Bedouins have pitched their tents : they sell postcards and some knick-knacks but they absolutely don’t care if you buy them or not. Drink some tea with them, it simmers continuously on the embers, try Bedouin coffee, so that you won’t sleep for a week, get into conversation speaking the language you want, Bedouins are born speakers. You can also spend the night with them, the atmosphere is nice but comfort doesn’t exist. Avoid films as their expiry date has often passed for years and for this be careful everywhere!
You haven’t to be careful in any other situation as Jordan is one of the most peaceful country I have ever visited, and one of the safest: no thefts, no repeated offers, no tricks, no violence. Trust is at its top everywhere. Too many potential tourists mistake Jordan for Cisjordan: here there are no machine guns, no tanks, or soldiers, policemen are kind, Jordanian people are friendly and amusing…. It’s a pity Jordanian tourism has difficulty in developing but take advantage of it! This country which is as beautiful as Egypt (and decidedly less expensive) will soon be polluted by air-conditioned coaches. You’ll need a day to cover the road of the desert castles as there’s a castle every 15 Km. In my opinion the most beautiful ones are the first and the one in Azraq, an oasis where you’ll have lunch. I suggest you the pergola of Al-Shallal al-Mountazat (take the first on the right after the black castle) where Lawrence of Arabia is said to have slept. Pay attention! He is the Napoleon of those places, he slept everywhere, he went everywhere, and you’ll even be shown the places he never set foot in: I assure you he never came here! No? oh, click, thanks Kodak, a room which never saw Lawrence of Arabia!

You’ll come back by the North road, but it would be a pity to set apart only a few minutes for Umm-al-Jimal. My suggestion? Pass Azraq flat out to walk quietly through the moving ruins of Umm-al-Jimal till the sunset. So you won’t miss the shadows which spread over the desert ruins of black basalt where only sheep and goats live. The inhabitants suddenly abandoned Umm-al-Jimal in 747 A.D. but nobody knows why: in that period the country was quiet. Three centuries b. C. the town barricaded itself very quickly; people unsealed the tombs of its cemetery to change them into ramparts. Even in this case, no historian finds reasons… I fell in love with Umm-al-Jimal, along the Syrian border, next to Irbid.
Imagine the contrast: Irbid holds the world record of internet-cafés all in the same road. A hundred and two cafés share the main road along which you must walk at night when this university town known all over the world looks like Las Vegas for its luminous signs.

Jordan is to be tasted in complete quietness, only a few tourists venture alone: so much the worse for them but so much the better for us! You can only meet organized groups you can easily avoid as they are very predictable. Jordanian people would appreciate it if you visit them alone and without any guide. They love helping you: make the visit in the opposite direction, tourists generally go back at half-tour. If you don’t travel by coach you are not a tourist, you are a guest !
Return at Amman. It is not a beautiful town, the cement suqs are not attractive, but they are practical, you can stroll around without any fear. In the town centre, the Roman theatre is well preserved: here you’ll meet nice guides, officially polyglot who don’t know too much about it but who proudly show off their qualified guide badge. Choose one: he will show you a lot of details and he will suggest bringing you to the citadel. Follow him, this sightseeing point is worth visiting, as some ruins, well restored by the Spanish.
In Amman I can recommend you two hotels, with a strong preference for the reception and the kindness of the staff of the Hisham Hotel. Here you can rent a car two or three times less expensive than at a tour operator or at a booking central unit such as Avis or Europcar !
You can also eat there (the restaurant is correct, nothing more), and everybody will do his utmost to help you, to give you advice, to take you out of trouble…
The exchange rate is good: when you go to Jordan bring American dollars with you, it’s the unofficial currency which sets everyone smiling. You can draw Jordanian dinars from cash dispensers with your Visa card: they are everywhere, even in the provinces. The Hisham Hotel is the address in Amman you can’t miss, but it’s often full, of course. The stopgap is the Canary Hotel.
You’d rather eat in small dives such as Al Maeda just opposite the Roman theatre where I suggest you to avoid the typical Bedouin dish (I have even forgotten its name) they want you to taste. I love discovering new flavours, but it’s objectively awful, here and elsewhere. Stubborn as I am, I’ve tasted it several times. No restaurants drew my attention, particularly the well known ones, very disappointing. Honestly I hadn’t time to explore Amman modern area, living by night. I will reserve it for next time. Jordanian gastronomy is similar to the Syrian, Lebanese and Turkish ones: first of all starters (meze), hummus, crudités, salads and above all mixed grills, shish kebab, skewers ….with excellent bread.

Leaving from Amman, don’t miss these other tours: in the north, don’t miss Umm-al-Jimal, Ajlun, Umm-Qais and especially Jerash about which I could tell for hours (give my regards to my friend Mohamed, suqs seller). When you want to eat, go away from the sites, walk a few steps and don’t fear entering the small restaurants such as Janat Jerash and Al-Khayyam in Jerash.
You’d better sleep at Ajlun not because it’s far, but because the hotel and the restaurant are worth the detour. It’s the Al Rabad Castle Hotel: nice staff, high quality food and an unforgettable sight !
In the morning, the mountain road which leads you in the Jordan valley is unforgettable.

Jordan is a land of contrasts, a patchwork of landscapes, a snakes and ladders game where you can regularly move along the pictures: desert and steep mountain, rock desert, the Jordan fertile valley, then farther on the Dead Sea, new mountains to go back to Madaba, south-west from Amman, blue, red, yellow rocks ...
Jordan is the most beautiful country I have ever seen in all my life, even one of the most pleasant. Another site making me to say Jordan is as magnificent as its neighbouring Egypt is Petra, a Nabatean town which is so beautiful that makes you cry, so moving and grand that it alone would justify the journey, if necessary! Here too, in the evening choose local restaurants in the town centre where no European goes strolling as everyone shuts himself up in their luxurious hotels. I suggest you the Rose City Restaurant, some metres far from the site entrance in Petra.
Here you’ll eat extremely well at low prices without any alcoholic drinks even if Jordan wines are very good and above all very promising, such as Latroun, Mount Nebo… Next time, it’s a promise !
Petra is a Nabatean town: its buildings, its houses and its shops are built directly in the rock and you’ll get there through a long gully dug by water into the rock two kilometre long. The first monument you’ll find is the Treasury where Indiana Jones found the Holy Grail and Tintin met the Emir Ben Kalish Ezab in “Coke en stock”, the father of prince Abdullah, a rascal breaking everything in Moulinsart, who was given a spank by Captain Haddock and Tintin in “Au pays de l’or noir”. The allusion is clear : the new Jordan King is the ancient prince Abdullah.
You can find it in his personal site www.kingabdullah.gov.jo.
I’ll soon tell you about Petra in detail, but also about Wadi Rum, Aqaba that I didn’t like, Jerash where I’d like to live and everything else…
I’m going to paraphrase Kennedy in Berlin: I’m a Jordanian!

paru dans Gazoline 75 de décembre 2001
© Pierre-Brice LEBRUN & Gazoline