Above: Making a stop near the border.
Today, all of four of us will venture from Syria into a new country, Jordan. We took a taxi to Baramke station to try find a service taxi to Amman. But we didn’t get very far because, en route, the taxi driver found us a service taxi that would take us to Amman.
Things got a little dodgy with the driver of the service taxi. Because he had picked us up on the street he was hit with a fine. So, he asked us to pay a baksheesh to the first taxi driver that found us the ride. Not quite sure exactly how that works. Then at the border money changer, he may have tried to pocket part of our exchange. And finally at Amman he wanted extra money for locating our hotel because he had difficulty finding it.
The total journey from Damascus to Amman took 3h including 1h of border formalities:
- On the Syrian side leaving Damascus, we went through an area with lots of black rocks before getting more desolate.
- At the border we saw the driver bribe the Syrian officials. Not sure if this was necessary or just to speed things up. Or maybe the driver was operating illegally? We never had any issues with having to bribe officials in Syria before.
- At the border crossing Kim noticed a Mercedes Benz car that was new and hadn’t been released. Being a car nut, he knew the current models. It must have been undergoing testing in the desert climate. [This was soon after released as the C219 CLS Class.]
- On the Jordanian side, the customs check was strict. The officers lay down on the road to look at the underside of the car. They scrutinised the car and driver but had no interest in us foreign tourists.
A yet-to-be-released Mercedes Benz model presumably being tested in the desert climate.
We took lunch at the Canary Hotel where we were staying. It was an awfully long wait for the food but when it arrived, it was well worth the wait. Fired chicken, meat patties, schnitzel and fattoush.
After some rest, we took a taxi to the downtown area where we walked around the Roman Theatre. We needed some Jordanian dinars and managed to get some from an ATM, third time lucky. We bought some towels as we hadn’t brought any, and also some souvenirs for Fiona to take home.
I don’t like Amman. It seems to be scattered over so many hills with no single beating heart or centre. Yes, it is cleaner and more modern and Jordan’s countryside isn’t as badly littered with plastic bags.