I was surprised by the amount of Xmas in a Islamic country. Not only were there Christmas lights, a Christmas decoration shop but I did even see images of Santa! So there was no real way that Dad could pretend that it was not happening! Dad have even put up Christmas lights! But Xmas dinner was an very Jordanian experience (and tasty too)
As my tour of Jordan had not included the city of Amman Dad became my latest tour guide. There were two main sites that needed attention. And both again showed the influence of Rome. The first stop on our whirl wind tour of Amman was the Citadel, one of the highest points in the city where you could get a great view. There were also of impressive ruins on the top of the citadel, most of Roman origin but apparently some date back to the bronze age.
Most of the site is in ruins and it was odd to be able to go up to the remains of Roman buildings and not only handle them but walk all over them. Not exactly what Rome had in mind I think, nor would modern Italians be that pleased I think. In Italy you can barely get near things! One of the most impressive Roman ruins was the Temple of Hercules which I did have a really good climb on.
Mixed in amongst all things Roman there were things that you would have classify as more Islamic which of course dad had to get a photo of.
Down on amongst the city itself there were two Roman theater, one quite large but I liked the small, intimate one.
Dad was lucky enough to have a friend who was willing to be our chauffeur so we were also able to visit sites outside of Amman. I was very glad that Dad had spent some time with Nazim (our 'chauffeur'), schooling him in the traditional road rules as driving in Amman was quite an interesting experience but I am pleased to say that Nazim did a great job and there were no accident (even the one flat tyre on the way to the airport was very swiftly dealt with!)
One of the site we visited was Iraq Al Emil ( and Dad's favourite joke of the day was that this was the closest I would get to Iraq!)
Next stop Morocco!
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