I happened on the way to the font...

I guess I should say, for history sake, that our family was able to go on an amazing trip to Jordan over spring break.  I could have never guessed what a fantastic place this is!  I had very little expectations - and it truly turned out to be one of my favorite places on earth.  (I know, I know...you've heard that before.)  Several people had told me how great it was, so I then had to convince Peter.  We kind of went thinking that it is so near to The Holy Land, included in much of the Bible, that if for nothing else - we should probably go.  Our main reservation was this:  We LIVE in the Middle East, why would we want to 'vacation' here?!

Boy were we wrong.

Because I had to twist Peter's arm to go, one of my bribery tactics was this, "I promise.  I will drive the entire way.  You won't have to drive once!"  Remember that we like to travel, not vacation.  I am the one who ends up booking all these crazy places where we rent a car and go all over the place - and Peter does the driving.  Once again, I had booked and made plans to drive from Amman to Aqaba.  (top to bottom of the Jordanian map)  So I had to swear I would do the driving.  More on that later.

Anyway.  We arrived at 9 p.m. and got our rental.  (It happened to be our exact same car we have here - a Ford Expedition.  Easy enough!)  We took a beautiful evening drive winding down from Amman to the Dead Sea, overlooking the lights of Israel (Palestine) the entire way.  We settled into a lovely resort on the Dead Sea (see the stingy dead sea post) for the night not knowing all adventure was awaiting.

First order of business - The Baptism site.  Where John the Baptist baptized Jesus in the River Jordan.  But this part of the story is what happened on the way to the 'font'.

Here I was, just happily doing my promised driving job.  Jordan's road aren't marked all that well.  In English, anyway.  We knew the round about location of the site, very near the resort.  But when we got to a fork in the road, we decided to break right.  What a beautiful sight.  Green fields of produce!  Where we live, things don't grow.  I've never seen any kind of green field here, so it's always a pleasant sight to see things like this. 

A couple of minutes down the road; an adorable family of camels.  (pictured above)  Aren't camels pretty?  Did you ever think they came in such a variety of colors?  I love them. They are a happy thing about living in the ME.  They were just walking down the street.  Their shepherd was right near by and moved them out of the way though.  Next thing we see, is a big tourist bus behind us, well - we must be on the right track.  We WERE heading to a tourist site, right?  Never mind that they all had little white hats on their heads.  (Muslim and Jewish wear these kinds of things)  We pulled over and let them pass, so we could follow.  But then, it seemed too far.  Maybe we were wrong.

Turn around.

Pass the camels again.

No.  It must be the other way...

Turn around again.

Pass the camels again.

This time we were in it for the long haul.  (not very long - like 20 minutes maybe)  We came to a T in the road; again most traffic was heading to the left.  We knew the River Jordan acted as a border between Jordan and Israel, so we turned left.

A minute or so later, there were a lot of buses and taxis around.  So we looked for the parking area.  Ah!  An entrance gate up ahead.  I pull up to a few men with guns in uniform (a very normal sight here), and I roll down my window:

They grunt.  "Hi.  Where do we park?"  I ask.

 "Palestine?!" 

"What"

"You want to go to Palestine?"

"No. We want to go to the baptism site.  Where do we park?"  I say.

"You want to go to Palestine?!"  they say.

Peter:  "I think we're at the Palestinian border crossing!"

Uh.  What!?

"Uh.  We're looking the baptism sight.  You know.  John the Baptist?  Jesus?" 

"Jerusalem?  You want to got to Jerusalem?"

"Well, yes.  Um.  I mean not now though.  We want to go.  Well, could we go?"  I look a Peter?  Should we?  No.  Better not try it.  Plus - we don't know what we're getting ourselves into here.

"Palestine?!"

"No.  Jesus.  Baptism."

Now they're calling all the other guards over.  No one speaks any English. 

Now they are giving me the TURN AROUND RIGHT NOW, LADY! gesture.

We're all a little confused, but do what they say, of course.  Someone else stops us, no idea what we're talking about.  (please keep in mind, we find out that we are like 10 minutes from this amazing historical site - NONE of these people knew what we were talking about.)  Just to be safe.  We decided to  head back they way we came and take the other fork in the road.

Pass the camels - again.

We laughed the entire way back.  You have to know  a couple of things:  You can't just cross the border into Israel, and because of where we live over here, we CANNOT go to Israel.  (there are ways to do it, and we plan on it someday, but not THIS day)  Just to cross normal, you cannot drive.  You have to take a bus.  (remember the bus?)  Then you have to get a taxi on either side when you cross.  (remember the taxis I mentioned)

Anyway.  It was SO funny.  A white, non muslim, American, wearing a t-shirt, WOMAN trying to drive her husband and five kids across the Palestinian broder.  TOO funny!

The Baptism site was pretty cool though.

This picture here is where they believe it actually happened.  As you can guess, no one knows for sure. But this 'font' was built originally, like 200 years after the baptism, on the record of verbal history.  It is at the end of a small tributary of the river. (or what is left)  Which makes sense that they would use a more calm part of the river.  Of course, the river has changed a lot over the these couple thousand years.

You can see behind the kids here the actual river.  It used to be 60 yards across, they say.  It's now 6 yards.  I'll save our actual experience for another post. It was interesting.