We woke up with incredibly sore legs after walking so much the day before. Thankfully, the day was pretty light. We were set to make our way to Wadi Rum, which is something that we were really looking forward to.

The drive wasn’t too terrible – we made it to our camp pretty early. We were able to check in right away – which was awesome! We were so excited – we had paid for an upgrade to have a Martian tent. It was worth every penny!

We were set to do a 4×4 ride through the desert right away. Most people sat in the back of the truck bed, but there wasn’t enough room for all of us. Andy and I were inside the back of one of the trucks, at first it was a little disappointing that we weren’t outside. We quickly realized that the sun was hot and even more dusty.

A few people offered to switch spots with us, but we decided it was fine inside at that point. We stopped at a few different scenic points from different movies – or that were just naturally beautiful.

I think we were on the tour for about 2 hours. We got to see quite a bit. After we got back, we had a few hours before our communal dinner.

We relaxed in our tent – and then took a few pictures as the sun was setting. We had heard another guide tell his group to arrive on time to watch them pull the food out of the ground. This is a traditional way of cooking – called a Zarb. Marinated meats and vegetables are buried in a sandy oven in the ground – which is supposed to leave the food really moist and flavorful.

We had dinner with some individuals from our group – which was really fun to sit around and chat. I didn’t want to say anything out loud, but all of my food felt really gritty. I compared notes with Andy later, only to realize it was me! I still had sand in my mouth from the 4×4 ride!

We had signed up for stargazing because Wadi Rum is supposed to be a dark sky environment. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as dark as some of the places that Andy and I have visited in the past. It was really cool though, there were two parts. The first section was pointing out different constellations and the second section was looking through five different telescopes that were pointed at different items.

Sirius, the brightest star – the North star – a nebula in Orion’s Belt – Pleiades – and one that we can’t quite remember. On both the way there and on the way back we did get to ride in one of the 4×4 truck beds. Glad we got to do it on a short distance – and at night!

We returned to our tent because it was late at that point. It was a really unique way to spend our 10 year anniversary!

Hotel:

Hassan Zawaideh Camp (Martian tent)

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