April 1, 2008 by Luke.

As I just said Petra is A lot like Machu Pichu. It was like being in peru again the site was a lot bigger than the machu pichu site but still had the same amount of people vist it per day but I felt safer at machu pichu because if you hit Machu Pichu it would not break but if you hit petra it would break because it is made of sand stone. Sand stone is sand grains stuck together to make a sand stone. pretty simple eh? The first stop was a temple in which I saw on the drive to wadi Mousa (the modern day town beside ancient Petra). As we were looking at the view I saw it and asked what it was. The driver said horse’s. I looked down and people on horse’s were passing by it. When I said “no, that” he said “yeah horses” so in the end I did not find out what it was until we saw it up close. As we neared it I saw it first and said “hey that is what I saw from the view in the car”. We got near the dam and our guide explained that about 9 years ago the dam broke and 13 French women and their guide died. So they made a new dam and that lasted a few years then they blocked of the water and the dam became a wall then a hill to get to the bottom. The path leads to a canyon and you walk a mile until you get to a treasury. The treasury is said to be the most amazing sight in Petra. Then you walk though a much smaller canyon until you get to Petra city. Petra city had a population of over 35,000 they built caves that were rectangular. What amazed me was that they could have saved a bit of carving by making the corners curved but no they had to make them at a 90 degree angle’s. We ate lunch at 1:30 and then traveled a bit on our own We went around a small mountain And met a mother and her son still living in a cave. We met the son first he was herding goats as we chatted (he knew good English) while walking up the road he asked if we wanted tea we replied no thank you sorry he nodded and continued chatting until we got to there cave his mother came out of the cave and asked us if we wanted tea we replied the same as before and then she asked if we wanted to buy souvenir’s we also replied no dad was thinking about giving them a bit of money until the mother pulled out

A. a whack load of money
B. a bottle of coke for her son
C. Cigarette’s

Please send your comments as your reply

When he saw this he thought if she can afford ( your answer here ) she doe’s not need my money.
That was that. We went on like that in the end It was as I said earlier Just like Machu Pichu.

Day 2

Today We did not get a guide instead we traveled around at our own pace. It went on the same as yesterday until we got to the treasury. We had a bit of negotiation and finally me and Alex got a camel ride. It was very Scary. S-c-a-r-y scary. They have triple joints so you get on them there front legs go up whoop. Then there back legs go up wooo. Then there front legs go up more waaaa. Finally there back legs go up more weeee. But faster So Whoop wooo waaaa weeee. pretty scary Ay. We ate lunch at a cliff and stayed there for an hour and a half. by now it was 1:03. then we explored a bit getting pics we did not get yesterday We went back to the mountain we walked around the day before and walked to the top where the crusaders castle was it was the highest we got at Petra. finally We started climbing down When We had no path We found a path of our own. That made us the first torist’s to go into the theater. it was blocked off so no tourist’s could get in but not blocked good enough. We were neaing the end so we dicied to get a donkey ride back once again me and alex were the luckey winner’s it was fun but sad the kid’s that owned them were whiping them and pulling there tails so they would go faster. My donkey was funney it took the path with it’s eyes close. When we got off I huged mine he was Sooooo cute. We walked the rest of the way And said goodbye to Machu Pichu….. I mean Petra

Posted in 2008-02 to 04, Africa | 2 Comments »

April 1, 2008 by AJ.

We just left Egypt yesterday and we saw Petra today and are all very tuckered out! Petra was amazing! It has about 3000 visitors a day, but that hardly seems real, because the whole site is very spread out. To put it another way, You’d never know there was that many people. To describe Petra in one word, WOW! They have done amazing stuff there. Pretty much all the town was carved directly from the mountain, and majority of it is still connected to the mountains. The colors of the rock are amazing! There is blues, greens, reds and a few other colors. If you went exploring, and you weren’t careful, you could easily get lost and have your camera battery’s empty, and your camera card totally full of pictures, never mind videos! Breaking news, both cameras aren’t really working. In mine it still works, but the pictures button is stuck. So if I turn it on, it will take a picture, then get frozen on that picture, and you have to turn it off again. On the family video camera, the lens cap was having problems opening sometimes. S’all for now!

Petra Day Two

Today we saw a bit more of Petra. We found out that the little sand bottles that they make is actually sand from Petra. I would love to buy one though. We got a very good video of me throwing a colored chalk rock on a real rock, and it looks very neat. We also met up with George and Monica again in one of the restaurants. We went up quite higher then we did yesterday. I think we went up to the crusaders castle, which was quite high, and had no railings. Imagine how shakey mom was! Also we did a little circle on a camel, which was very scary, but fun! They don’t seem very tall, but once you get on one, you can see for miles and miles (sorry, kilometers and kilometers). And when you are going down it is quite a dramatic angle! I thought I was going to fall off of my camel! And once I got off, someone came up, gave my camel some water (it drank right from a bottle) and gave the man a kiss afterwards (it twas a tourist)! When we were leaving, my dad got a good price for some donkeys, and Luke and I rode one for a while (we both had our own donkey)! I think I cost 7 JD (about 10 Canadain dollars). It was very fun and well worth the $10. Mine was dark brown and Luke had a white one. The owners were boys, probably not much younger then me. I think Luke’s donkey was partially blind, because he would sometimes get to close to the edge, and scrape Luke’s leg. Both the boys were steering my donkey, so Luke was kinda on his own.

Posted in 2008-02 to 04, Africa | No Comments »