Petra Part 2

After a few minutes the drivers were yelling at us to get back in and up the gorge we went, going like crazy and splashing up the what was now a pretty substantial river and out to the gate. Turns out that our guide had found someone in the security group who was his wife's cousin or some such thing and had asked a favor to allow these people who had come all the way from Canada to at least get into the city.

So that was that. What was supposed to be a six hour walking tour of Petra became a walk in the rain and a 15 minute visit to the temple at the start of the city.

Another trivia bit. The first 1.2 KM are a very tight trail between cliffs. But there are still many areas that have been carved out of the rock. At one point our guide explained that when this was discovered, and up till 1980 there were Bedouin people living in many of these "caves." He pointed out one where it was obvious that someone had been living in there because the roof of the cave was blackened by smoke from cooking and heating fires. He explained that after the family moved out, they decided to do some excavation in the cave and found evidence of at least 25 bodies buried under the floor.

 

So much of Petra is really just an elaborate mauselum. It is hard to say how many people actually lived there. For sure it seems like a lot of people died there.

Who ever they were, they were obsessed with death, and the afterlife. And they left an absolutely beautiful and mysterious place as a part of their heritage.