ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, January 14, 1996 TAG: 9601120092
SECTION: TRAVEL PAGE: G6 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WADI RUM, JORDAN
SOURCE: CHRISTOPHER REYNOLDS LOS ANGELES TIMES
The desert canyon is long, sandy and bare. At its edges, stone cliffs of red and orange rise 2,000 feet into the sky. The wind races. Along a lonely two-lane road, a few dozen yellow-shirted bicyclists wheeze past on a ride for charity, modern anomalies crawling through the ancient world at 10 mph. So far, you could be in Utah, Arizona or New Mexico.
But then you see the galloping camels, hear the boys shouting in Arabic, smell the Bedouin tea brewing, notice the old Nabatean temple crumbling by the canyon wall, and feel an invisible weight that might be this place's incalculable natural history, or its implausible human history.
Nomads have probably wandered in this canyon for 50 centuries, as control of the territory has passed from Arabs to Greeks to Romans to Turks to the English to Arabs again, since 1953 in the hands of Jordan's King Hussein.
Not quite 80 years ago, in this same canyon, a young British intelligence officer named T.E. Lawrence rested before battle here in his adopted Arab robes, then rose to charge alongside Bedouin warriors in the British-supported Arab revolt against Turkish rule.
Then 34 years ago came English director David Lean, who shot parts of ``Lawrence of Arabia'' here, giving Peter O'Toole his first leading role. (``It is my pleasure that you dine with me at Wadi Rum!'' thunders Anthony Quinn, playing an Arab chieftain who invites O'Toole to dinner before their successful attack on Aqaba.)
Now, this canyon, about 30 miles northeast of the Red Sea and the Israeli border, is among the handful of sites driving Jordan's new life as a mainstream tourist destination for Westerners. There's nothing so grand (or unnatural) as a hotel here, which may be why many tour itineraries still bypass this place. But you can rent a Bedouin-style tent for the night, dinner and breakfast included. You can take a camel ride, at varying rates, or an exploratory drive in a sport-utility vehicle, and follow it with a buffet lunch (overpriced at $10) at the Government Rest House. You can have tea or a water pipe (tobacco only) delivered to you at a low table.
I began my journey with a border crossing from Eilat, Israel, to Aqaba, Jordan's only port. From there I roamed to Wadi Rum, then about 50 miles north to Petra; from there, I traveled about 160 miles northwest to Amman, then to the old Roman city of Jerash.
Aqaba is Jordan's toehold on the Red Sea, a scant 15 or so miles of coastline. Its position as the country's only port makes it a town more dedicated to shipping than to tourism, a place of boxy, beige buildings and the occasional mosque minaret. Aqaba sustains a few hotels, a small downtown area, an aquarium and a handful of dive centers. Scuba divers and snorkelers can sample the truly spellbinding variety of underwater life in the Red Sea, one of the world's foremost underwater destinations because of its clear visibility and variety of marine life.
Petra is an entire city carved from red rock, accessible by walking or riding (horse, camel, donkey or carriage) half a mile through a narrow, winding passage known as the ``siq.'' The city was built by the Nabateans, who ruled the trans-Jordan area about the time of Christ. But the site was largely forgotten by the West until 1812, when Swiss adventurer and Arabist J.L. Burckhardt disguised himself as a Muslim scholar, persuaded some Bedouins to guide him into the ancient city so that he could leave a sacrifice at a holy site within. Historians say he was probably the first Westerner to lay eyes on the place in six centuries.
Millions of contemporary Americans, conversely, have already seen Petra without knowing it. Director Steven Spielberg used the ruins' most striking building, the 130-foot-high, rose-hued Treasury, as a backdrop in his 1989 film, ``Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.''
Beneath the natural and man-made rock formations, Bedouin merchants peddle tea and snacks, sweaters, carpets, goblets and little bottles filled with decoratively colored sand.
Like all of Jordan, Amman can be quite affordable. Taxis are cheap - a few dollars gets you just about anywhere - and some of the nicest restaurants (outside of hotels) will feed you dinner for less than $10. Beyond that, downtown is full of budget hotels.
The greatest draw of greater Amman, however, is Jerash, a sprawling ruined Roman city that lies about 30 miles north of the modern capital.
Some historians say that human settlements at the site date back as far as 8,000 years, but it was the Romans who built most of what remains. They gave Jerash more than 1,000 imposing stone columns - about 300 are standing, and more will rise as restoration continues. They fashioned an oval piazza that sets newcomers to thinking about the Piazza San Pietro in Rome. They built an amphitheater that still fills for an arts festival every July, and used the roads so heavily that even now, 20 centuries later, a visitor can kneel and see ancient chariot ruts in the stones of the old road. Then there are the old floor mosaics that resemble half-done jigsaw puzzles.
LENGTH: Medium: 94 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: 1. Jordan's Wadi Rum, where Bedouins have wandered forby CNBcenturies and visitors can sleep in a Bedouin-style tent. color
photos by author
2. A meandering passage (above) leads to the Treasury at Petra, a
city carved from rock. color
3. Men gather in a downtown Amman coffeehouse (right). color