Amman November 4-15

I arrived back in Amman at 12:30 am on Friday November 4 on my flight from Chicago that had stretched over three calendar days and I got back to ACOR at 2:00 am.

In the following days I worked on my marble chapter for the Humayma excavation report and the Dalman translation.

But the main reason for my return to Jordan was because John, Renee, Linda and Dennis had booked a cruise from Barcelona to Dubai that was to dock at Aqaba and Eilat on November 10 to 12. John had been to Jordan back in 1974 and again in 1995, but not Renee, while Linda and Dennis had never been outside of the USA before. So I returned to Jordan to show them around southern Jordan for the three days.

I rented a car and drove from Amman to Aqaba during the night of November 9-10, arriving early in the morning. Their disembarking from the cruise ship was delayed for several hours, so we did not meet up until 1:30 in the afternoon. That cut short what we could do before sunset, but I briefly showed them the possible third-century church in Aqaba, before we drove north to Humayma, where I showed them around my excavation areas from the 1990s. I noticed that there has been a lot of illicit digging recently in the lower church.

 

A recent robber's pit in the lower church at Humayma

We then continued on the road to Petra, stopping at the scenic view point over the Araba Valley at Rajaf. We arrived in Petra after sunset and checked into the Petra Moon Hotel.

The next day, Friday November 11, we went sightseeing in Petra. We walked through the Siq and stopped at the Petra Church, where I had worked in 1992-1993. We proceeded to the restaurant for lunch. Linda, who was having difficulty walking, then stayed behind, while we others went to the Monastery and back. Linda then rode a donkey up the back entrance to Umm Sayhun as I followed, while the others walked back via the Siq. We all eventually reached the hotel. We then went to a restaurant in the town of Wadi Musa for dinner, after which I drove them out to Beidha to the north to see the landscape by moonlight.

A rock-cut Nabataean cave at Petra being used as a parking space

 The third day, Saturday November 12, I took them to the Crusader castle of Wueria and then the Siq al-Barid antiquities in Beidha in the morning. I then drove them down the new road to the Araba highway near Feinan and then as far north as Ghor al-Safi, at the south end of the Dead Sea. We stopped at Lot’s Cave, and then briefly at the robbed-out cemetery and sugar mill at Naq‘, where I had most recently worked in 2004.

Me in the apse of the church at Lot’s Cave

 We then proceeded to Aqaba, arriving at 2:00 p.m. That left enough time to see the archaeology museum and Ottoman fort quickly, before I dropped them off at the border crossing to Eilat at 3:00 for them to reboard the cruise ship.

I then drove the four hours back to Amman, arriving none the worse for wear, given how many hours I had driven in the course of the day.

Back in Amman, on Monday November 14 I attended a lecture at the British Institute by Martin O’Kane on Depictions of Islam in European Biblical Art, followed by a reception. Later that evening I met Muhammad Ghosheh and we talked about his forthcoming book about the Dome of the Rock.

On the evening of Tuesday November 15 I went to the airport for my flight to San Francisco to attend the annual meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research.