After leaving our hotel in Petra, we headed off to see the spectacular valley of Wadi Rum, a desert area in southern Jordan.

Unfortunately, the longer we drove in the hot van, the more and more I felt a raging migraine coming on in full force.  After we stopped at a rest point to pick up water and refill gas, I knew that this wasn’t going to get any better.

We arrived in Wadi Rum, and from there loaded our gear into a truck, while we climbed into a separate Jeep.  After about a half hour of driving through the desert scruff and sand of the valley, we arrived at our camp, which was five black and white striped tents with metal frames huddled in the shadow of a mighty cliff.  I suppose this sheltered arrangement kept seasonal (perhaps fierce) winds from damaging the camp and wreaking havoc.

Once we settled down into our huts and collected our bags out of the second Jeep, we all gathered down in the main “dining tent”, and chatted.  As we began to get to know each other, I was excited to realize that I could actually understand a fair amount of what Professor Awad and the Bedouins were talking about, despite the rapid pace of the conversation and the Bedouins’ strange pronunciation and accents.  In addition, the Bedouins served our group this scalding, but deliciously rich and sweet, tea in small glass cups.  Several servings of this, in addition to a large glass of severely bitter thyme tea that one of the younger Bedouins was kind enough to steam up for me, began to slowly put my headache at ease.

As the sun began to set on our first day in Wadi Rum, our driver, Bisam, led us courageously up the side of the cliff behind our camp for an amazing view of the blazing sky behind the far off mountains.  Despite the sometimes challenging (read: terrifying) stunts that Bisam wanted us to try to scale the face of the mountain, the view from the mount was well worth it, and we all enjoyed watching the sky slowly get darker and darker and the shadows on the rock around us deepen and lengthen.

After a dinner of rice, chicken, yogurt and yet more tea in the food tent, we all wandered out into the desert around us to behold the phenomenal collection of stars the midnight sky had to offer.  As we lay in the sand and (tried to) sing traditional arabic rhythms, I imagined a vast hand plunging into an even vaster bucket and strewing an immense volume of stars across the sky.  Some stars even came free of the velvety inkiness and went streaking to the horizon, and had our group exclaiming each time we spotted one.  Just before moonrise, we even grabbed a rare glimpse of the Milky Way as puffy cotton clouds just above the now shaded cliffs around us.

Come morning, I was up and ready to photograph the sunrise from outcropping close to the food tent.  Despite clouds to make it as the stunning Missouri summer sunrises I knew so well, it was still an incredible sight to see the light break over the blazing red mountains in the distance.

After a quick breakfast, everyone loaded into the Jeep again, and we went for a desert safari.  One of the most exciting parts of the trip was climbing a enormous sand dune and getting an amazing view from the top of the shifting sand heaps.  Once everyone had gotten to the top safely, we all joined hands and sprinted a few stories to the bottom of the dune, laughing as our feet threw up puffs of sand in our wakes.

Before we knew it, it was time to bid our Bedouin friends good-bye.  They graced us with a traditional large meal of rice, chicken, bananas, pita and tea in his home as one final gesture of hospitality before we headed off.  Leaving the vast expanses of Wadi Rum, we turned south and entered the highway, heading to the southern most tip of Jordan: the Port of Aqaba on the Red Sea.