Day 184: The King's Road (31/07/2011)

Faced with a choice of a battered taxi or a crowded bus ride to Jordan’s capital Amman, neither seemed particularly palatable.

Fortunately Petra Gate’s owner, Nasser, had a beefy 4x4 and happened to be visiting the capital on business. If we paid for his petrol, he said he would take us there up the King's Highway rather than the motorway, and stop off at various sites on the way. We agreed and headed for our first stop – the petrol station. As the dials on the pump span in a blur our bargain began to look a little suspect.

Petrol in Jordan is not as cheap as its neighbours as they have no oil and the friendly ‘all in this together against the evil Zionist oppressor’ attitude that most Arab nations subscribe to, is trumped when cash is at stake. This is why Israel is as safe as houses – but perhaps not the ones they build on occupied Palestinian land in breach of international law.

The tank filled, I drew the line with Nasser at the three jerry cans and the fuel bowser we were towing and we got underway at a cost something akin to a hired ride up the motorway on the Hezbollah Express; the Palestinian influx after the disastrous war with Israel in 1967 means that most taxis are driven by these refugees. As a result we could look forward to 350km without any anti-Israeli propaganda or an unstable improvised explosive device in the foot well.

As soon as we left the forecourt, Nasser began a high level physics experiment by bending the fabric of space-time with the near light speed velocity of his two tonne truck. At the same time he complained bitterly about the cost of running his 4.5 litre time machine but by happy paradox, most of the truck’s mass was converted to energy, so we didn’t use too much fuel after all. The Middle East was largely oblivious to the rip in space-time as they were all too busy grumbling about Saudi oil prices and their children ignoring the requirement to fast during Ramadan.

Leaping the regular speed humps with suspension destroying force, we meandered up the old road before peeling off to climb the gravel track that clings to the steep approaches of Mont Real – The Royal Mountain. On the conical escarpment sits the Crusader castle of Shobak. Built by Baldwin I and taken by Saladin in blah, blah, blah…

It is not well preserved but has a few good arches and its walls are seemingly impenetrable. Dropping at 45 degrees from the base of the king’s court is a rough cut escape tunnel that runs 500m under the escarpment and out onto the plain below. Using the light of my phone, I ventured 30m into the darkness before losing my nerve shortly after the first bend and running back into the light like a frightened child. Before the castle fell in 1197, the tunnel was used, leaving Saladin to scratch his head at the apparently undefended castle that had held out against him for so many months.

By now Nasser was hooting his horn impatiently, keen to get underway. In his rush to complete a three point turn he exhibited his increasingly alarming tendency to accelerate hard at steep and entirely unprotected mountain drops. Rather than braking as he surged toward the cliff edge, he merely dropped into reverse, hammered the throttle and relied on the wheels to gain traction on the loose gravel and save us from a spectacular 500m cartwheeling death.

It wasn’t immediately apparent that he had got the calculation entirely right, as the tyres spun, gravel flicked over the precipice and the truck continued its inexorable progress toward the point of no return, seemingly unaware of its own imminent demise. I threw a panicked glance at Nasser as his face crinkled in the way that can only be achieved by someone on whom it is just dawning that they have irretrievably fucked up something really important.

As happens in times of high drama, time slowed down and my mind raced to make sense of the unfolding situation. Could I undo my seat belt and get out of the door before the truck lurched over the edge? Did Japanese cars explode in mid-air as soon as they went over a cliff edge, like American ones? Was there still time to take a picture and save myself and which should I do if there wasn’t? These and a thousand other thoughts crowded my head as the 4x4 slowly began to pull its undercarriage back over the edge.

All the while Clare leafed blithely through the pages of Horse and Hound in the back seat, apparently unconcerned at her imminent and recently rescheduled appointment at the Pearly Gates. After all,  she was probably thinking – there are ponies in heaven.

Once the blood had returned to Nasser’s face, we wound back down the track and onto the King’s Highway. He had clearly learned a lesson, but not, apparently, the same one as me. The needled tipped 140kmh and the suspension gave up complaining as we hit more speed humps like a tactical air strike.

We did stop briefly.

We saw Dana, a nice 15^th century hill top village, sitting on a rocky outcrop. We paused for a reprise of the Shobak stunt, only this time over the much higher and steeper drop into the magnificent Rift Valley. We hurtled along the mountain road down from the plateau to the Dead Sea, out of the relentless desert, past the endless salt pans and into the verdant strip beside the water.

The Dead Sea is the lowest place on earth, some 400m below sea level. Part of the Rift Valley, it was flooded by the Jordan; but as the river has been exhausted my modern water demands, the Dead Sea has lost the flow sufficient to connect to the Sea of Galilee a few miles to the north. The salinity climbs year on year, rendering the water useless to man and unable to support life.

Ignoring for a moment the ecological and agricultural disaster that water shortages will bring, or the inevitable war that will follow in the region, the Dead Sea is super buoyant and it is great fun to float ridiculously high in the water, reading the newspaper for the famous photo-opportunity. The slightest unhealed cut stings like you have rubbed salt into the wound – which of course, you have. Salt crystals form on your skin and anything man made you take into the water promptly falls to pieces within a day or two. As I say – a great experience.

Racing around Amman for his son’s high school results, Nasser was disappointed. His first and second offspring had achieved 99% but the third was languishing at a paltry 89%. Either Jordan has the worst grade inflation in the world or he had sired a clutch of geniuses and was currently unaware of it.

The traffic was heavy and the Education department threatened to close by 2.30pm and so Nasser began to fiddle with the driving mode button on the dashboard. We had used 'sport' leaving Petra. 'Reckless' got a brief look in at Shobak. 'Stunt' saw us passed Dana and we had been firmly in 'Breakneck' mode ever since.

It was time to engage the 'Suicide' setting to do battle with the capital’s rush hour. Flames came out of the exhaust and the engine made a noise like Satan’s bowel movement as Nasser hurled the truck at the stationary traffic ahead of us. There may have been some time air-born – I don’t know; my eyes were shut and my head was between my legs. Maybe we spent some time on two wheels but who can say. Taxis hooted as we careered the wrong way down one way streets. Rubber burnt on the steep hill turns of downtown Amman. Finally Nasser turfed us out with a smile with some pretty good directions to the Cliff Hotel where we were staying that night.

Off he screeched into the traffic as we picked up our bags and tramped down the hill in the afternoon heat, suddenly missing the air-con in the 4x4. Somewhere in the distance was the sound of tearing metal and it wasn’t long before smoke appeared over the roof tops from the direction that Nasser had gone.

The Cliff hotel was run by the friendly chain smoking Fahoud. The power was out and the ceiling fan stood silent as we dropped our bags in the room sized oven that was our bed for the night. We dined on more foul and pitta bread at Hammesh, Amman’s most famous dining experience. The seats in the alley were a bonus which no one seemed to mind.

When the power came back on the fan merely succeeded in moving the hot, humid air around and the night was sleepless. Soaking our sheets in water was the best we could do but they were dry in 30 minutes and when dawn came, we checked out as soon as was respectably possible and moved to the Palace hotel five doors down.

 Frankly, it could have been a hole in the ground for all we cared, just as long as it had air-con.