Hello everyone and welcome to another journey of mine in another country. If you already follow me and check my travel posts, you will know how much i love traveling. In case you don't follow me, yeah it's true i love traveling.
In my previous journey, you had the opportunity to take a glimpse of Cyprus, and more specifically one of its cities Larnaka with its amazing beaches and churches. This post was quite a hit i dare to say and i am really thankful that you all liked it. Hopefully, you visit Cyprus and my previous post will help you make your experience a bit better.
Now as you can see above and as i mentioned as well, you guys really like and supported my travel post and i couldn't be happier. Thus, @pinmapple you asked for more activity and similar posts and i will deliver. But enough of this let's start!
Last year i decided that i wanted to go on a trip outside of Europe but at the same time near Europe in terms of distance. I really hate changing flights and be on an airplane for many hours, i am really bored. At the same time i wanted to see a different culture and something that i have never seen before, as i am that kind of traveler.
Even though Jordan wasn't top on my list a friend suggested it to me, i read that the country was actually pretty safe and i also knew a few things about Jordan's history which made it easier for me to choose it as my next destination.
So me and my friends decided to go there for a week, rent a car and explore everything that we could in these 7 days. Now because i really have been and stayed in a lot of different places in Jordan, today we will only speak about Amman but you will see way more in other articles i will be creating in the next days.
Jordan is a small country with around 11 million population,around the same as my country Greece. At the same time is pretty close to Greece in terms of distance. I think i took a 45-minute flight from Greece to Istanbul and then around 1 and a half our from there to Jordan, or something like this, so the distance is pretty much nothing.
Jordan Facts and History
One of the big differences between Jordan and Greece is the religion. Jordan has 96% of Muslim population and 3% of Christians while Greece has around 93% of Christians and 2% of Muslims. It was the first time that i was traveling in a Mulsim country so i read some articles first on how to get dressed because i didn't want to disrespect in any way any country that i was visiting.
Here is some info about Amman for all those who are interested, more than 4 million people are currently living there and there is a lot of history "hidden" in that place. To begin with, the earliest settlement there was during the 8th millennium BC. Then it became the capital city of the Ammonite kingdom,then the Ptolemy 2 came and the city was named Philadelphia and that meant that Hellenistic culture was added. Romans were next and then the Ottomans.
As you can imagine all these different civilizations left their marks which you will all see in pictures later on. Currently, the way i see it Amman, has a side where the old city is with older buildings and many archeological monuments and there is another side with more modern buildings where most corporations are located.
In general, it is a vibrant city with a lot of people going out to do their jobs, pray, drink coffee or tea or in general hang out with friends. Personality, even though a lot of people were looking at us i didn't feel any kind of threat.
In fact, 3 things amazed me that i totally didn't expect. The first was the influence of Hellenistic and Roman architecture and monuments that still existed which i was completely unaware of as a Greek, the second was the freaking awesome food and the third how cool and helpful all the people were.
Honestly, i have been to many countries and i couldn't even compare their food with the Greek cuisine but Jordanian cuisine was pretty tasting, especially the Mansaf was out of this world! Mansaf is a traditional dish with lamb cooked in a sauce of dried yogurt and served with rice!
Amman Must-See Sites
We first arrived at Amman, the capital of Jordan, we rented the car and headed straight for our Airbnb. The plan was that we would stay our first 2 days in Amman as well as our last day there in order to be close to the airport. The Airbnb was located in the old town and the view was literally breathtaking!
We walked a lot during these 2 days, there are many hills so you need to have some practice if you decide to only walk in Amman. We ended up in the Roman Theater which was pretty close to our Airbnb. The theater has a Greek inscription, that indicates that the theater was built in honor of Emperor Antoninus Pius. 6000 people could sit there and even now it is used for some cultural events. It was amazing that you could actually see preserved that good still used!
From the theater, you could see the Citadel which many years ago used to be connected with it. Mostly all the civilizations and cultures i mentioned above live in the Citadel and ofc added their own cultural marks like the Temple of Hercules, a Byzantine church and the Umayyad Palace.
I honestly don't remember the costs to get to all these archeological sites and monuments but i remember that we have bought the Jordan pass. With paying a decent amount you could receive access to many sites not only in Amman but throughout Jordan and the visa was also included. For us, if we had visited everything without using the Jordan pass we would have paid around 200 euros more so it was really really worth and i suggest checking it out before you go.
My Opinion for Amman and Suggestions
Even though i have seen more beautiful cities than Amman, i was really positively surprised with what you could do and see there. The monuments and historical sites were amazing and i didn't even know all of these things existed.
As i said i didn't feel any kind of threat or scared at all which from other articles i have read depending on the country you are visiting things aren't always as good as you might think beforehand. There were a lot of different places to eat, from vegetarian food, to meat and from team and coffee to ice-cream and crepes. Honestly, it had almost everything but alcohol as it's not allowed in their religion, for me that i don't drink alcohol in general was not a problem at all though.
Try the Mansaf, try the kebabs and try the pita that it is offered with basically any kind of meat dish you might order. Also, and this is very important, the people there were some of the nicest, most helpful, polite and good people i have met almost anywhere.
I don't know if it has anything to do with us being Greeks, because everytime we mentioned our ethnicity, they all seemed very happy almost immediately. To understand better what i am saying, if we asked for direction or a local opinion on something, they would try to help us out, take us there, give us their phone numbers in case anything happens and without asking the usual "tip" that many do in other countries.
They were genuinely trying to help and when i asked some of them why all of them provided the same answers. "Because you are Greeks and we love Greeks", Yunan i think we called there, and "Because we want you to have a good time in our country and tell more people about it".
Finally, regarding the prices, everything is quite affordable especially if you are from EU Countries or America. You can change your money in the local currency either in your country or directly in Amman. In fact, we managed to find better rates in Amman than in Greece. You can use revolut or credit cards as well but not everybody accepts credit cards so i suggest to have some local cash with you!
Have you visited Jordan and if yes what did you like about the country?
Stay tuned for my next post, as we stayed in Petra, Wadi Rum, and Aqaba!
all the photos have been taken by me and i reserve the rights.
Top photographs. Thank you for sharing a little of your trip 😊
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Hi. I did the same trip in the year 2000. Private driver , me and my wife and third person. Small car. Snorkel in Accaba south of harbour...very nice!