JORDAN - Scenic Places & Leonid 1999 Storm @ al- Azraq Desert Camp
Part 1 of III - Pre-storm activities :Lectures,
Petra's Khasneh
Always curious about the flight path whenever I
fly , so I make sure I get a non-blocking window seat. I tried to
figure out the flight path/time by drawing a map on the back of a flight
magazine. This time the Airbus took the Greatest Circle path ( up Peninsula
Malaysia) and cross the Indian Ocean onto India. We flew over India with
a great river in sight and approached the 'horn' of Arabic peninsula, passing
over the giant Sand Dunes of Omen. The Airbus landed in a small country
Bahrain facing Persian Gulf . The Bahrain International Air Port is situated
on a small island with a link to the 'mainland'. Transit was less than
one hour and I proceed straight to check-in. We changed to a smaller
Air Bus and in two hours time I reached my destination - Amman, Jordan.
A twenty plus of us from various countries ( USA, New Zealand , Ireland, Armenia, Belgium, Syria, Australia, Iran, Iraq, Netherlands, Germany, Palestine, United Arab Emirates ) convened in Amman, Jordan at the invitation of Jordanian Astronomy Society. I was lucky - I approached JAS early October and was quickly added to the guest list as they are in the midst of getting representatives from abroad.
We spent the first few days attending conferences. High light include talks on Leonids dust trails, the use of narrow beam radar in meteor detection ( down to magnitude 15!), shown slides of Germany's 98 Leonids trip to Mongolia, Netherlands Leonids trip to South Korea and historic Leonids events in the Arab world. We also visited the Al al-Bayt University 16" SCT and a quick tour of the geological department/lab.
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| Above Left : Prof. Jack Baggaley (NZ)with the C16" SCT | Above Right : Al al-Bayt University's Dome for the 16" CAT |
| Right : I received a JAS Leonid 99 Plaque from Prince Faisal
of The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. This day happened to be King
Huessin's birthday. We visited the Town Hall and were shown photos in memory
of him. The love exhibited by his citizens were evident from the constant
throngs to the galleries. I was touched. Later we had a sumptuous Jordanian
feast - 'mansaf' - "lambs- and- rice" served western style. |
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For the first few days we spent some interesting hours touring the Roman-
ruins in Jarash and have a whole day trekking in the famous red-rose sandstone
ruins in Petra. Visiting Jordan without seeing Petra is like visiting Egypt
minus a visit to the Great Pyramids. The beauty of Khasneh is beyond
description - the facade stand 130 feet and 92 feet wide carved entirely
from the sandstone! To reach this marvelous sight we have to walk 1.5 Km through a narrow gorge - flanked by 100 meters sandstone called the Siq. After a 1.5 Km walk through the Siq, suddenly through the 'slit' you see a glimpse of the Khazneh - the treasurer. The whole splendor of the Khazneh appear in front of you. You must give credit to the farsightedness of the ancient builder for intentional placing the Khazeh at the strategic end of the Siq. |
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| We threaded along the narrow Siq , always on the look out for giant boulder fallen from above. (just kidding) This 5-man-height boulder probably fallen many many 'moons' ago! | .... Then the Majestic Khazneh appear in front of you - the whole structure glows in the golden afternoon sun. < remember the movie Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost ark ? It was filmed here!!> |
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| Khasneh's closeup view #1 | Closeup view #2 |
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Mosaics art from one of the two aisles of the Byzantine church depicting animal species. |
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| If you are tired to walk there are camels or for hire. | Colonnade Street restored in 1960. In the distance is the Royal Tombs. |
Petra is famous for its polychrome color sandstone. The best examples I came across are as follow:
Above: The 'ceiling' of one of the tomb chamber.
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| Above: 'The Elephant' - Beautiful polychrome color of sand stone. | Below: Xmas deco ? No! Plants strive on polychrome rock face. |
| On Nov16 we left our comfortable hotels and headed
for a desert camp in Al-Azraq ...
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| Next >> Part II ( Part II Meteors Fever Nights) |
| ( Part III - Afterthoughts>>) Part III |