Jordan - Walks, Treks, Caves, Climbs and Canyons
Jordan-Walks Treks Caves Climbs and Canyons
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The time has surely come when the world will ‘discover’ the real Jordan and the charm
of its proud but hospitable people. When it does so it will find a country more
rich in historical heritage than Egypt of the Pharaohs, with more archaeological treasures
than Greece and a scenic magnificence rivalling the Grand Canyon and Yosemite.
Portrait of a Desert Guy Mountfort (1965)
Jordan is a land of unexpected beauty and vast variety. Discovering its savage river-filled canyons, awesome mountains and deserts, delightful flower-filled springtime meadows and pine-forested northern hills can be a life-changing experience. Add to this the remarkable hospitably of its people, particularly the Bedouin with their contagious good humour, and any visit to this remarkable Middle Eastern country is guaranteed to more than fulfil expectations. Welcome (Ahlan wa sahlan) to Jordan, its land and its people.
As its title implies this guidebook describes walks, treks, caves, climbs and canyons in Jordan, the majority of routes being half- to one-day walks or multi-day treks. There are also descriptions of over 30 canyons, all of which involve walking and scrambling in rivers, usually in inescapable surroundings subject to flash floods and sometimes requiring abseils. Very few caves are described since a limited number have so far been discovered, but Jordan’s climbing potential outside Wadi Rum is revealed for the first time and five ‘new’ climbing areas are covered with pointers to others (climbing in Wadi Rum is described in our book Treks and Climbs in Wadi Rum, Cicerone, 4th edition 2007).
In total 150 routes are covered along the length of the country, mostly in the western hills above Jordan’s extension of Africa’s Rift Valley, the location of Jordan’s border with Israel and the West Bank (Eastern Palestine); whilst in the southeast of Jordan along its border with Saudi Arabia 24 desert and mountain walks and scrambles in Wadi Rum are described.
There are routes to suit all abilities in all categories, though there are as yet no ‘difficult’ caves; nevertheless it should be remembered that all caves are hazardous and more may yet be discovered. Any route requiring special skills, equipment and/or a guide is identified as such in its introduction. Any reasonably fit person should be capable of doing the short walks, although a degree of route-finding ability is sometimes necessary due to the lack of available maps other than those in this book. It is difficult, however, to imagine any reader having problems following the most popular walk, the Petra Siq, and most will be happy on the easy to moderate grades in any category. Note that guides should always be considered if recommended.
Highlights include springtime excursions in the flower-carpeted ‘alpine meadows’ of the north; the spectacular Dead Sea canyons; the multi-day Dana–Petra treks; the superb walks and treks in and around the ancient city of Petra, one of the recently proclaimed ‘New Seven Wonders of the World’; caving and climbing in Jordan’s exotic limestone regions often reminiscent of the south of France; and for the full Bedouin experience a night in a real Bedouin camp in Wadi Rum combined with the ascent of a Bedouin hunting route, perhaps to the Rock Bridge, the summit of Jebel Rum or Jordan’s highest mountain, Jebel um Adaami, with a Bedouin guide – finish it all off with a snorkelling or diving trip on the coral reefs of the Red Sea and what more could you want!
Prior to the first edition few of the routes had been documented yet – apart from the few climbs, caves and more serious canyons – this is largely a book of ancient trails, some originating as far back as Iron Age times or even before, as early man spread across the land making his home in sheltered valleys and constructing dolmens and forts to guard the heights.
History
Stone tools from the Palaeolithic era possibly dating back 250,000 years were left in Jordan by early man who wandered the hills and valleys hunting large game animals now only found in Africa. Settlements dating back 10,000 years have been excavated. The Edomites, Moabites, Amorites and Ammonites settled these lands around 1200BC. Moses and the Israelites reputedly passed through the mountains and deserts of Jordan about this time, though expert opinion differs as to exactly when.
The Nabataeans ruled here from 500BC to AD100, controlling the trade routes and the transport of precious silks and spices from the Orient and distant Arabia Felix (Yemen). The ubiquitous Greeks and Romans left their imprint, as did the Byzantines and the soldiers of Islam, the forces of Saladin and the invading Crusaders. Hardly changed by time and the swirl of events, the wandering nomadic tribes of Bedouin settled or passed through on their migrations, in search of grazing and hunting. Their black tents still adorn the windswept plateaux, open deserts and hidden green valleys, moving with the seasons, although their numbers are falling and life is getting harder as the government endeavours to settle them.
Travellers like Sultan Baibars, el-Bakr, Burton, Burkhardt, Doughty, Musil and Lawrence have journeyed through the land, documenting their adventures. It has been fascinating to read these stories of discovery, and to follow in their footsteps and those of the shepherds who still wander Jordan’s quiet hills and valleys. Hopefully you too will share in the delights of treading these routes, both ancient and modern.
The people and places that inspired the book
As well as the basic directions necessary to follow the routes each description is accompanied by information giving a taste of the history and extraordinary variety and beauty of the land they pass through, enhanced by quotations from the poetic and romantic writings of those earlier travellers in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Their words inspired our explorations and took us to some quite unexpected places that most Jordanians didn’t know existed.
Most people find something uniquely special about trekking in Jordan, identified in 1938 by Louis Golding in his book In the Steps of Moses the Conqueror: ‘It is idle to compare phenomena like the Wadi Mojib and the Wadi Hasa and the Grand Canyon at Colorado in terms of figures and say this is the most impressive because it is the deepest and the broadest. Each is a unique experience, compounded out of its own elements of colour and proportion. There is, however, the element of the spiritual significance one rather than another may hold for the onlooker.’
Remarkably little has changed in the wilder parts of Jordan: the Bedouin are just as likely to appear from nowhere as they did 70 years ago when Louis Golding observed ‘Every now and then the totally uninhabited landscape would yield up a sudden crop of Bedouin who would hasten up to us to find out what we were all about.’ The inhabitants of the deserts and mountain valleys are fortunately less warlike these days than they were at the turn of the century when tribal squabbles were still common and guns and daggers seemed de rigueur. Thompson, in The Land and The Book (1859), describes the Bedouin as ‘land-pirates’, though most considered them to be as hospitable as they are now. Charles Doughty’s description, in his classic two-volume Arabia Deserta, of his arrival at an encampment in the late 1800s is typical and timeless: ‘The sun was setting and the camels wandered in of themselves over the desert, the housewives at the tent milked the small cattle. By the ruins of a city of stone they received me, in the eternity of the poor nomad tents, with a kind hospitality.’
Of course the cities and villages of Jordan have grown in size; paths have sometimes become drivable tracks; tracks have become roads; roads have multiplied. The Desert Highway, only a rough road 20 years ago, is now a motorway and the Dead Sea Highway has appeared from nowhere since our first descent of the Mujib Gorge. Even so, ‘off the beaten track’ you will find not only a contrasting land of harsh yet sometimes surprisingly delicate beauty, but also a people who will welcome you with a warmth of custom that has its roots in the not-so-distant hard life of the desert, as Geraldine Chatelard describes in her chapter on the Bedouin of Wadi Rum.
Be as good to this land and its people as they will be to you and perhaps it is not too altruistic to hope that both you and they, and thereby the world, will be a little better for your journey.
