TRIP NOTES New Year's in Wadi Rum 8 Days | Starts/Ends: Amman NEW YEAR TOUR: Celebrate a • Petra - Say hello to the UNESCO-listed What's Not Included Nabataean city that was all but lost to the festive Bedouin New Year’s Eve in • Tipping Kitty: USD$40-60pp, paid in local modern world until its rediscovery in 1812 the heart of the Wadi Rum Desert. currency • Wadi Rum - Witness this vast red desert Add the fascinating Lost City of • Entrance Fees: USD$140-160pp, paid in landscape with rolling dunes and local currency Petra, bobbing in the Dead Sea, dramatic rock formations • International flights and visa (see Trip exploring Roman ruins, and you'll • Shobak Crusader Castle - Explore this Notes for further information about visas) be kicking off your New Year in magnificent castle perched dramatically • Tip for your tour guide. We recommend on a hill top style! you allow USD$5-7 per day, per traveller. • Dead Sea - Float in the warm and buoyant Tipping your guide is an entirely personal mineral-rich waters HIGHLIGHTS AND INCLUSIONS gesture What's Included Trip Highlights • Breakfast daily and 2 dinners, plus New COVID SAFE GUIDE • Amman - Explore this Ancient hilltop Year’s Bedouin Party at the Wadi Rum citadel with its fascinating Archaeological Camp DETAILED ITINERARY Museum and the bustling souqs • 6 nights 4 star hotels • Jerash - Roam the ruins of the ancient • 1 night Wadi Rum deluxe desert camp Day 1 : Welcome to Jordan! Roman city • Wadi Rum - 4x4 desert safari through the 27 December. Once you arrive in Amman you • Umm ar-Rasas - Visit this ancient city sand dunes are met at the airport and transferred to your and important stop on the caravan route • Dead Sea - Free time to swim and detox hotel. The rest of the day is free to spend at between east and west with breathtaking • Touring - Amman, Jerash, Dead Sea, your leisure. views Petra, Wadi Rum, Shobak, Umm ar-Rasas, Overnight - Amman • Umm Qais - See the Roman Decapolis Mt Nebo and Madaba City, once a cultural centre and home to • Escorted by a licensed Jordanian tour poets and great philosophers guide and English speaking specialist • Mt Nebo - Stand at one of the most guides at some local sights sacred sites in Jordan with views across • Airport arrival transfer on day 1 and the Promised Land departure transfer is offered on day 8 at • Madaba - Stop into the Christian market 23:00 (day 7), 04:00, 07:00, 09:00, 12:00 town, Church of St George and Jordan’s and 16:00 only finest Byzantine mosaics • All relevant transfers and transportation in private modern air-conditioned vehicles New Year's in Wadi Rum - 8 Days updated on 24-09-2021 06:00:38 www.onthegotours.com This information has been compiled with care and good faith. They give an accurate illustration of the proposed arrangements for this holiday. Circumstances beyond our control such as changes in local conditions, inclement weather or other reasons could force us to make changes to UK 020 7371 1113 [email protected] this itinerary. Any costs shown are subject to change, though are an accurate reflection of costs at time of writing. Please also note that visa AUS 1300 855 684 [email protected] requirements are subject to change and are the responsibility of the traveller and not that of On The Go Tours. NZ 0800 44 77 69 CAN 1 866 890 7038 - 1 - USA 1 866 606 2960 SA 0800 990 311 TRIP NOTES New Year's in Wadi Rum Day 2 : Jerash & Umm Qais Gadara was renowned for its cosmopolitan atmosphere, attracting an array of writers, Leaving Amman we’ll stop first at Mt. Nebo, artists, philosophers and poets. It also served the site from which Moses saw the Promised as a resort for Romans vacationing in the Land. Having led the Israelites for 40 years nearby al-Hemma hot springs. Gadara was through the wilderness, Moses finally saw blessed with fertile soil, abundant water and them from this impressive vantage point. This a location astride a number of key trading amazing panorama includes the Jordan River routes connecting Asia and Europe. Valley, the Dead Sea, Jericho and the spires and domes of the Mt. of Olives and Bethlehem The city thrived until the Byzantine era on the Judean Hills just across the wide valley. which witnessed the decline of Gadara into Later, we visit Madaba en route to Petra where Amman - Jerash - Umm Qais - Amman. relative obscurity. Earthquakes destroyed we see the Church of St George, the Madaba Your tour guide will usually be at your hotel many buildings, and by the dawn of the Islamic Archaeological Park, Apostles Church and at approximately 7.30am for your Welcome era Gadara had become just another village. Madaba Museum. Meeting. Throughout the tour, you are fully The town became known by the Arabic name briefed by your tour guide with regards to Umm Qais during the Middle Ages. Today, Our next port of call is Um ar-Rasas, one of your touring arrangements. At the Welcome a considerable portion of the original Roman Jordan’s World Heritage sites and once an Meeting, a modest tipping kitty is collected amphitheatre has survived and the seats here important stop on the busy caravan routes. from everyone (as noted under exclusions face west, and are brought to life at sunset. The impressive mosaic floor of the St. Stephen on page one of this document). This tip kitty Next to the theatre is a colonnaded street that Church features medallions commemorating covers all the tipping throughout your tour once probably was the town’s commercial all the early Christian pilgrimage sites of the (to baggage handlers, porters, drivers and heart. Also, near the black basalt theatre are region, and the extensive ruins also include ancillaries). The tip for your tour guide is not the columns of the great Basilica of Gadara. one of the area’s earliest Stylite towers, where included in this tip kitty and should be given Further west along the colonnaded street are a Byzantine hermit lived atop the tower and at the end of your tour for a job well done a mausoleum and public baths. preached to the pilgrimage visitors. (for information about tipping, see “Tipping” Later this evening, we head out for a meal and further down this document). a stroll along Rainbow Street to experience Our final stop of the day is Petra. Want to learn Today we tour Jerash, second only to Petra modern Amman with its hip bars, rooftop how to cook Middle Eastern food? Consider in touristic appeal, the 2,000 year-old Graeco- restaurants, art studios, and bookshops. our Petra Kitchen Add-on tonight! This is Roman ruins of Jerash are recognised as Overnight - Amman (B, D) available on Tues/Fri only. As such, this is can one of the best-preserved member cities of be booked on the 2020 depature, but not the the Decapolis, a confederation of 10 Graeco- Day 3 : Mt Nebo & Umm ar 2021 departure. Roman cities. When Emperor Hadrian paid Rasas Overnight - Petra (B) a visit in 129 AD, the place was buzzing. The citizens built a Triumphal Arch for Day 4 : The Rose City of Petra him which still stands today. Exemplifying the finesse of Roman urban life, the town boasts a hippodrome, the old sports field that once held 15,000 spectators, a stunning amphitheatre with amazing acoustic abilities, the forum which gracefully links the main north-south axis of Jerash, a colonnaded street paved with original stones and the rut Amman - Madaba - Mount Nebo - Umm ar marks of chariots, a nymphaeum replete with Rasas - Petra. Today we tour the citadel and ancient fountains trimmed with dolphins and Archaeological Museum of Amman before we Chief among Jordan’s many archaeological various temples. take a walk through the bustling local souk to riches is the UNESCO World Heritage From here, we travel to the modern town of enjoy typical Jordanian street treats of falafel Site of the Rose City of Petra. The city Umm Qais, which is the site of the ancient and hummus at the country’s most popular was first settled around the 6th century Graeco-Roman town of Gadara, one of the local street stand. As the pictures on the wall BC by the Nabataean tribe from Western cities of the Decapolis with panoramic views will prove, the unglamorous food stand was a Arabia. A succession of habitation, leadership over the Sea of Galilee and the Golan Heights. great favourite of the late King Hussein. and further development followed, but as the caravan trade routes were gradually New Year's in Wadi Rum - 8 Days updated on 24-09-2021 06:00:38 www.onthegotours.com This information has been compiled with care and good faith. They give an accurate illustration of the proposed arrangements for this holiday. Circumstances beyond our control such as changes in local conditions, inclement weather or other reasons could force us to make changes to UK 020 7371 1113 [email protected] this itinerary. Any costs shown are subject to change, though are an accurate reflection of costs at time of writing. Please also note that visa AUS 1300 855 684 [email protected] requirements are subject to change and are the responsibility of the traveller and not that of On The Go Tours. NZ 0800 44 77 69 CAN 1 866 890 7038 - 2 - USA 1 866 606 2960 SA 0800 990 311 TRIP NOTES New Year's in Wadi Rum displaced by the advent of sea trade routes, be able to independently explore and stroll the city’s importance gradually declined and back toward the siq at a leisurely pace.