Dead Sea to Petra

Hello everyone,
We're finally in Petra and at a hotel with internet, time to update on the past 2 days. Yesterday started out in Madaba for breakfast, then we headed west to Bethany Beyond the Jordan, the site of Jesus's baptism by John the Baptist in the Jordan River. We walked down right to the river, and most of us leaned in and touched the water. Sean even brought back a water bottle full of it. The water was very greenish. We could see Israel only 10 feet away from us, there was a flag flying and some guards and construction workers. The Jordanian side had guards too, actually they took pictures with me, not sure what that was about! We ran into one of the architects behind the rebuilding of the site, and he was very enthusiastic and said that he is hoping for a million people to visit the site per year. Then we left and on the way out saw "Elijah's hill," where the bible says that the prophet Elijah was taken into heaven. Then it was on to the Dead Sea! We went through the Dead Sea Spa Hotel to use their changing rooms, from there it was on to the sea. Everyone enjoyed floating around and putting some of the mud on us. Apparently it's very therapeutic, there were lots of people there. There are some fun pictures and videos taken, so you all will get to see what it looked like. Then it was back to the hotel, where there were pools to swim in also. Finally we got a lunch buffet there and then headed to Dana. On the way we saw where "Lot's cave" was, where the bible says Lot hid after leaving Sodom and Gomorrah. We also stopped at a lookout spot to see the way the salt crusts around the edge of the sea. Then we drove to the Dana nature reserve, another RSCN site like Ajlun and Azraq. It was amazingly beautiful, way up in the mountains with huge rocks everywhere. We ate in a pavilion area and ended the day with tea in a Beduin tent and stargazing.

Today we ate breakfast at Dana and then hiked up one of the surrounding mountains (some of us took different trails than others!) We left around 11:30 for the Dana village near the campsite. There was a guide at the RSCN headquarters there named Ahmad, he showed us all around the center and museum, and we got to go into the workrooms and see the women who were making jewelry and other souvenirs. It was really great to see the local community working together to support the nature center. Ahmad took us on a walk in the local environment also. Then we left Dana around 4 and headed to Petra, where we've been this evening. We ate in the restaurant at our hotel, and some of us explored around the area a bit. We're preparing for 2 days in Petra starting tomorrow. More updates to come!
-Leah