update from Carl in the middle east 3-20-10

Hi,

I am now in Petra Jordan between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea. Today we left Amman Jordan passing through the suburbs on our way south. For the whole trip I have seen nothing equivalent to the slums seen on trips to Bangladesh and Kenya. The whole area including Jordan seems relatively prosperous including Palestinian areas of Israel (I did not go to the Gaza strip) and Palestinian refugee camps in Jordan.

First we visited the Roman site of the Citadel with more impressive ruins of a major Roman town. Our second stop was Madaba Jordan where there 3,500 year old ceramic representations of people and a church with a mosaic map of ancient Palestine that has been used to identify previously un-located archeological sites. We then drove to Mt. Nebo where Moses looked across to the land of milk and hone but was not allowed to visit. The view was magnificent across the green Jordan valley with white Jericho in the distance. On clearer days high building in Jerusalem can be seen and some say that even the Mediterranean comes into view. The group visited a modern mosaic factory employing physically challenged people. One couple ordered a $1,000 mosaic table to be shipped back to the US. We then headed south with the topography becoming more and more arid. It was not a desert of sand dunes but a rolling plateau of brown with the occasional flock of sheep and camels. We descended from 5,000 feet to 3,400 feet by my GPS to Petra and a five star Crown Plaza hotel for the night. The temperature is still cool.

Carl