Jordan: Tuesday, September 14: Dhlail, Azraq, and Zarqa

When we left the house at 7, a couple of the women were working in the garden. They showed us the pomegranate trees, the lemon trees, and a special medicinal tree. 

a pomegranate tree at the relatives--we picked fresh pomegranates every day. I could get used to that.

The family also has bees, goats, chickens, rabbits, and turkeys. 

Because the roof was flat, we were able to sleep up there. It was on the loud side when multiple adhans (call to prayer) were blasted out from multiple directions around 4:30AM, and once the sun rose at 6AM it became too hot, but it was an interesting experience. 

Sleeping on the roof.  One of the mattresses is a proper mattress. The other is a piece from a sectional sofa. Really quite practical. Like almost everyone else, we had a blanket underneath and another blanket on top. The top blanket wasn't always necessary. When the extended family was visiting, we saw these mattresses all over the patios.

We then drove to Azraq where we went on a jeep safari through the Shaumari Wildlife reserve.      The reserve was founded to preserve animals which were becoming extinct locally, especially the Arabian Oryx.  We saw several birds, onagers running in a line at a distance,  and several herds of oryx. Our guide also showed us several desert plants such as a salt plant used for salads (yes, it tasted salty), a plant used as a tea, and the herb artimesia.  

The jeep safari at Shaumari

Oryx at Shaumari reserve

That cloud of dust is a herd of Onagers running away from us.

Our next stop was the Azraq Wetland Reserve  where we did a walk along a boardwalk. This entire area had once been an enormous oasis, but so much water had been removed that in 1994 it had completely dried up, and the migratory birds had gone elsewhere.  The reserve has reintroduced about ten percent of the oasis.  We saw a number of small birds that we were not able to identify, a coot and an egret as well as a small herd of water buffalo imported into this area by the Chechens who had been relocated to this area by the Ottomans after the Russians had kicked them out in the 19th century.  

The Boardwalk

Water Buffalos

After this we drove back to Dhlail. We did a little shopping in town but after dinner we went to Zarqa to do some shopping.  I bought some conservative clothes since my next trip was supposed to be in Egypt which is even more conservative. 

Shopping in Zarqa