Where did the ancient city of Petra come from? It is believed that it was created by the hands of Nabateans, who carved their city into the mountains of Jordan in approximately the 5th and 6th Century B.C. then lived there for several centuries in numbers upwards of 20,000 before moving on for unknown reasons. [...]

I began to travel years before I had a blog, and in retrospect wish I could have shared those early, formative journeys online. I’ve recently found that looking at my old travel photos re-kindles not just memories but, at least somewhat, feelings. My digital photos only date back to the mid 2000′s, but there are [...]

Egypt and Jordan aren’t connected by land, but this doesn’t mean that you have to fly if you want to travel from one country to the next. Just last week I traveled by ferry from Egypt to Jordan. When I returned to Egypt, I traveled overland through Israel and will be writing a post about [...]

I am not a lover of the desert. However, I have actually managed to fall in like at first sight with Wadi Rum in southern Jordan. Translated into English, Wadi means valley and Rum means high place. This aptly named Valley of High Places has the most interesting formations sticking out of the sand which [...]

I have a confession. Although I love the Middle East, I was never very interested in visiting the country of Jordan. Lacking the ancient history of Israel and Egypt and the uber-wealthy cachet of the Persian Gulf, I didn’t understand its appeal. The past few years, though, I’ve spent so much time in so many [...]

If you’re the type who is sorry to see Christmas end each year, you can come to Egypt and celebrate the holiday twice. Christians in Egypt, called Copts, make up about ten percent of the country’s population and, like Christians in some other countries such as Russia, they are orthodox. I learned shortly after arriving [...]

I began to travel years before I had a blog, and in retrospect I wish I could have shared those early, formative journeys online. I’ve recently found that looking at my old travel photos re-kindles not just memories but, at least somewhat, feelings. My digital photos only date back to the mid 2000′s, but there [...]

Muslim countries aren’t exactly full of Christmas joy at this time of year. Yet for the second year in a row I, an avid lover of all things Christmassy, find myself living in such a country on Christmas. Last year it was Sharjah, UAE, an ultra-conservative Islamic emirate on the Persian Gulf. This year it’s [...]