Day 2: Amman - Ajlun Castle - Jerash - Amman
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Today we have met at 8 in the morning to start the excursion to Ajlun and Jerash castle in one day by taxi that we hired yesterday after arriving with the transfer from Amman airport to the hotel.
A good option is to book this excursion to Jerash and Ajlun Castle with a guide in Spanish, where you will be picked up at the hotel and you will also take a tour of Amman.
We leave Toledo Hotel at the scheduled time and first we go to the Ajlun Castle or Qala'at ar-Rabad Castle, where we arrived about 9.30 in the morning.
The Ajlun Castle We began to distinguish it from afar, we passed through endless wooded areas and we are surprised to see many people having a picnic, with cars parked on the side of the road.
Ajlun Castle
Comment that the taxi driver who has touched It is quite prudent, not like the one that brought us from the airport to the hotel, which was almost "worse" than the ones we took in Egypt or Turkey or some tuk tuk from Thailand !!
Interior of Ajlun Castle
We visit Ajlun Castle, where we pay 1 dinar per head, in about 3 quarters of an hour, with fabulous views of Palestine (which we met years later on our trip to Israel and Palestine) from one of its viewpoints.
Views of the surroundings of Ajlun Castle
The Castle and the entire surrounding area, it is certainly very beautiful, but we consider that if you do not have much time it is a dispensable visit.
After this visit we return along the same road to Jerash and we go to its ruins, where we pay 8 dinars per head to enter.
Jerash
Jerash Overview
This visit to Jerash yes we consider it essential on a trip to Jordan.
Jerash ruins
Its ruins represent one of the most important and best preserved Roman cities in the Middle East.
Jerash
Jerash ruins in Jordan
It took about 3 hours to see everything Jerash, stopping in almost every corner and making enough photos.
Jerash
We have been lucky with the day, quite a bit of air, from what we have seen, there in summer ... you can get hot!
We return to the taxi to go back to Amman and the taxi driver makes a brief stop at a viewpoint of the road and we continue towards the city.
We tell you to take us to the Citadel or the Amman Theater, the best area, as we have read, where to eat something. We comment on the excursion we want to do the next day and being the same “hotel taxi”, It goes up to 70 dinars, so we say that we will call you if we are still interested
It leaves us in the area of the Citadel where after verifying that there is no place of our liking to eat, we decided to enter the Theater for 1 dinar per person and thus leave that point made. After this visit we go down one of the adjacent streets, full of shops, but without a trace of restaurants.
Book the best rated Spanish tours and excursions in Amman by travelers:
- Excursion to Amman, Gerasa and Ajlun Castle
- Excursion to Petra
- Excursion to the Desert Castles and Dead Sea
- Excursion to Madaba and Monte Nebo
- Excursion to Bethany and Dead Sea- Many more excursions and tours here
We take advantage of the fact that we are in one of the most tourist areas of the city to exchange some money for a good change and without commission, not like yesterday at the airport, where we were charged.
In the end we ended up at the Cairo Restaurant, recommended by Lonely, where we eat kebab, chicken, rice, a soup and 2 drinks for 10 dinars, really cheap and all great.
When we finished we decided to go for a walk around Amman and see some more things in this area. As we go through the less traveled streets I have to say that I feel a “little bit”Observed, not only by men, but also by some woman, who looks at me in glances.
We ended up taking a taxi to take us to the Citadel, where you have to pay 2 dinars per person, since we have not been very interested in the “downtown" If you can make this visit in the morning or in the afternoon much better. The climb is exhausting and more after eating!
The taxi driver starts by wanting to charge us 3 dinars and at the end of the negotiation, he ends up taking us for 1.
Amman Citadel
From the Citadel there are some magnificent views of Amman, from where you can see the King Hussein Mosque, the Abu Darwish Mosque, the great flagpole, the houses, all of the same color ... From here you can really see how huge Amman is.
Amman
Since we are in this area, we take the opportunity to also enter the archaeological museum, where we can see the Dead Sea manuscripts.
Dead Sea manuscripts
We finish the visit almost at sunset and we go in search of a taxi that takes us to the Toledo Hotel but there is no sign of any so we have to start down on foot, with the luck that halfway we cross with one that It takes us to the hotel for only 2 dinars.
On the way he asks us where we are from. We tell you that we are from Spain and as it has happened to us on several occasions, on a day that we took from this trip to Jordan, they immediately associate it with football !!
More practical information to prepare your trip to Jordan
- 10 essential places to see in Jordan
- 10 essential tips for traveling to Jordan
He tells us that he loves Barça, that if Messi here and there ... total, he ends up asking us what we will do the next day. We give him all the explanation and we see that he knows the area and the hotel in which we will stay in Madaba so that gives us confidence and we ended up closing the deal with him for 50 dinars. In the end we have saved 20 dinars, comparing it with the hotel. We stayed with him the next day, at 8 in the morning, to embark on a 5-hour excursion that will take us to Madaba stopping at one of Jordan's Desert Castles.
We make dinner at the hotel restaurant, with a fairly acceptable meal and with a very tight price, where they even invite us for dessert.
It is time to go to rest that tomorrow we have another very complete day.
Day 3Amman - Desert Castles: Qusayr Amra and Qars Al-Azraq - Madaba
