April 7, 2008 by Rick.

There seemed to be many worthwhile sights in Jordan, but we just didn’t have the time to see much else. We had to arrange our own chartered van from Wadi Mousa (the modern day town adjacent to Petra) to Aman via the Dead Sea. Public buses only went direct to Aman, and didn’t make the detour West to the Dead Sea. On our way we drove through some harrowing canyons and along very precarious cliff edges before connecting up with the main highway. We had to pay almost $10 each at a picnic site that included a small park area, swimming pools (currently empty) and change rooms with freshwater showers. That was critical to rinse our bodies after floating in the mineral intensive “lake” waters separating that portion of Jordan and Israel. We only spent a half hour or so floating around in the Dead Sea. It was pretty cool and a little difficult maneuvering around without rolling accidentally and getting our faces wet, or trying to make sure not to splash the extra salty water into our eyes or mouth. Even our driver went in for a quick dip, before we dressed to leave. There was an expensive buffet on site so I loaded up a huge “to go” close-able three tray styro-carton for all of us to eat from. The rice, beef and salads were OK, but the roasted lamb were REALLY good. Even Claudette was smacking her lips and she traditionally doesn’t like mutton at all.

The remainder of our drive to Aman was uneventful. We were flying to Rome mid morning the next day and so just wanted to wander around a bit and relax. There were a few decent looking places to eat and even a movie theater. I stayed up late uploading pictures from McBride’s Egypt and our Petra shots to the gallery. The place was decent enough, but difficult to find and had lots of stairs. We look forward to Rome and Italy, and hopefully meeting up with the McBride Family again in France. We also REALLY look forward to our hotel rooms not being so close to Mosque’s and the requisite prayer call at 5:00 AM every morning, (not to mention again at 6:00 AM just in case you got back to sleep and several other times throughout the day). It’s a shame in this case that they have readily adopted the technology of using HUGE loudspeakers at the tops of the towers instead of a guy climbing up and shouting/singing which would have much less volume than the thousands of watts they crank out of the powered public address systems…

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

April 7, 2008 by Luke.

Sorry I am behinde here is what happened

Finally our curse is over. No more 5:00 in the morning until 7:00 in the morning and 6:00 at night until 8:00 at night prayer calls. You have no idea how tired I am. I am so tired my eyes are itchy and I feel like I am going to cry. I want to go to sleep but my eyes hurt so much I can’t.

The day so far was pretty Ruff. I mean R-u-f-f RUFF. First of all I went to bed at 8:45. Aex played the P.S.P until mom came in at 9:30, then when mom left she played the P.S.P until 10:30. I fell asleep then so I do not know how much longer she played. I woke up 7 times that night and each time I had to move the blankets. then at 6:00 I was fixing them when I was finally done and getting in the bed I heard ring ring and Alex got up thump thump Rin….. “Who is it” said Alex “Mom time to get up put on pants” she said so I stayed in bed. Alex was lying in bed telling me to get up and when I got up she stayed in. Then someone knocked on the door and Alex was like a rabbit being chased by a wolf Boing right out of the bed as I unlocked the door she was rushing to find her clothes. When mom and dad answered the door she was putting on her shorts. I was still in my underwear and my reply was I can not unlock my bag as Alex stopped for a split second and twitched. When I found out there was a heater and above the heater was a sign that said “turn on heater.” We went off to the airport just after (They did not have breakfast for another 15 mins.) we were dressed and started to check in then a problem occurred. My ticket had something wrong with it so we had to buy a new one. While mom and dad were doing this they put our bags on the plane and I was not checked in. So while this problem was happening dad found out he left his visa at the hotel so he phoned them up to come bring it no problemo Right? Wrong the hotel was 40 min”s away. So we went and got though immigration while dad stayed behind and waited for his visa. The next bad thing that happened was we got to the first immigration desk number 8 and he told us to go to immigration desk number 1. So we went there. He told us to go to Immigration desk number 2 so we went their. He told us to go to another desk because our tickets said we were a group. In the end we had to pay 10$ each to get past. To top that off we had to wait another 50 mins for dad to get back so we could tell him that he had to pay 10$ to get past

The flight went as planed but the airport did not the luguage was not there for an hour. I was panicking the first thought that oh no they put my luguage on before I was checked in and that our luguage was taken off the plain well I was wrong. When I was waiting for the luguage I started righting this post that is why it is very disceptive. Bye Luke.

Posted in 2008-03 to 05, Europe | No Comments »

April 7, 2008 by AJ.

We have left Rome, and now we are in a villa like place in Florence (Firenze in Italian). It very muchly reminds me of Germane Lake (in the winter)! It was freezing cold when we got in and it took a while to get the air warm and the floor (even though its the next day) is still cold (but it has a few warm spots. Luke and I built a fort (on the fold out couch, which I share with Grandma Vi) and it wasn’t folded out, and we both could lie down inside. We just used blankets, 3 couch pillows (they are smaller then pillows you would normally sleep with) and a chair. Inside, Luke watched me play on the PSP and it is much warmer than outside. The adults played crib, and dad lit a fire, it’s much homier for us, and gas (for the furnace) is 4 euros for a cubic meter of gas (home gas, not car gas), which we have to pay for once we leave. But we still are using the stove (which uses home gas, just not as much). We are only using it to heat up water for coffee (and hopefully hot chocolate later) so by the time we leave (in five daysish) we will probably only have to pay 4 euros total (for the home gas).

Posted in 2008-03 to 05, Europe | No Comments »

April 7, 2008 by Rick.

We barely knew what to expect going to Petra. We’d all only really seen pictures of the “Treasury”, an extraordinary building cut into a tall face of sandstone rock. We’d heard from others that the “city” and general site was far more expansive and even more impressive than just that one iconic representation. No words could prepare us for the vast amount of work that had obviously gone into creating such a “wonder” as Petra. After two days of walking around, constantly open jawed in abject shock and appreciation, I really believe that Petra should be reconsidered as the Eighth wonder of the ANCIENT world. It is every bit as remarkable an achievement as the original seven.

We booked a guided tour for our first half day, which was invaluable. Not only did he describe what everything was and how the society had lived, but he took us to some outstanding out of the way places. He not only showed us some great places off the main paths, but positioned us for many great pictures and unique photo frames of parts of the city and/or ourselves. His insights and little “side” stories were very worth the extra $75 for us four to join the 10 person tour.

After our tour we wandered around by ourselves for the latter half of the day. It was nice and relaxed, but still our feet all hurt by the end of the day. I know it’s a good day when our feet hurt… The entire city “site” is very extensive and clambers up and down and around a few valleys in the area. There are a huge amount of caves all over the place. The entrance of the city is called the “Siq” and is a long (1.5ish KM) twisty, narrow rift or canyon. The sandstone colors and swirls are absolutely spectacular, not to mention the carving of a water trough all the way down to supply the city. The Siq comes to a “T” intersection at another canyon right at the treasury. The Treasury “building” is most widely associated with Petra and was the final scenec of the third Indiana Jones movie. It’s use is still hotly debated today. Only two floors show, but the canyon floor is said to have about 7m of silt & sediment washed down the canyon by a breach in the dam at the start of the siq that was left unrepaired for about 100 years. Our guide from the morning had been a senior archiologist several years previously and detailed the lower excavations of a couple of tombs in front of but below the existing floor of the Treasury. This is one of the few large buildings that was carved into the cliff face with a large countersunk distance into the face to protect the facade from water runoff during the rainy season. It was shocking to see recent (in the last several years) photographs and videos showing huge rivers of flash flood water running down the wider canyon in front of the treasury. That wasn’t half as surprising as seeing pictures of snow in the city! This included in front of the Treasury and even all throughout the city.

The central area of the city is just a little past the exit point of the main canyon that houses the Treasury and several other equally tall and majestically carved buildings. From this sort of central point we could see cave holes littering all of the mountainsides in every direction. There seemed to be no end of them if we zoomed in with the camera or used the binoculars. Many more large carved buildings into cliff faces could be seen all up and down this valley, as well as into two adjacent valley’s. There was only one “built” building still standing due to centuries of earthquakes in the area. This was only because it had horizontal wood beam “buffers” built in to the walls every 4m or so up the stone block face. Most all of the caves and large rooms carved into the mountains were still in remarkably good condition though.

The Bedouin people were all moved out of the caves in the mid 80’s by the government. A whole new town was built for them only a few kilometers away to live in. Many still make the daily trek into ancient Petra to sell animal rides, or all sorts of trinkets, or to just beg.

We spent a few hours off the regular beaten track hiking around a small mountain and exploring the incredible sights. We used one 1.4GB disk in the camera each of the two days we were there. That fact alone speaks to the spectacularness of this ancient city, never mind the fact that I was really restraining myself. Many vendors and four ridiculously expensive restaurants lined the wider valley. Some locals were offering donkey and camel rides for outrageous prices as well. A two minute ride in front of the Great Pyramid of Giza near Cairo was only $2. In Petra a two minute ride was $15!!! I knocked them down to $7 each for the two kids, but still felt badly for missing out on the (shockingly) much more reasonable prices in Egypt. Additionally many local Bedouin kids were found along various trails with an interesting collection of rocks picked up around the area that they were only too happy to sell to any passing tourist. We also passed by a few Bedouins living there who offered us to sit down and have tea. This would probably necessitate a tip afterwards, but the offers were very friendly and genuine unlike in Egypt. One vendor was selling a book about his mother who was a New Zealand tourist in the 70’s who married a local Bedouin guy. She settled down into cave life, cooking all meals over an open fire and they had two children together over the years. He supported them by selling trinkets and souvineers to tourists. Claudette bought the book and is quite captivated by it so far. Alex will read it next and then we’ll send it home.

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

April 7, 2008 by Rick.

Yes, we are again behind a few posts… We met up with Claudette’s Dad & Rick’s Mom in Rome on April 2 as a surprise for the kids. We spent a few days seeing the local sights, (and uploading many Petra and some remaining Egypt photos). On Sunday April 6 we took a train to Tuscany, near Florence where we rented an apartment for a week to relax and see Venice & Piza from. As incredibly beautiful as the are is, it unfortunately, it has terrible public transportation and I came back to Florence today to rent a mini-van for the duration of our stay. We have all written some posts which we’ll upload in the next week when we get net access for a everyone for a few hours. The town we are in now barely has sketchy cell phone access, never mind internet. We are all well, and still don’t have a clue on how we’re gonna end the trip! (Either driving across Canada in two weeks or spending more time in Nova Scotia, The Rock, and BC and flying across the country…)

Posted in 2008-03 to 05, Europe | 2 Comments »