Date: 2005-04-09
From: Amman

To: Ma'in hot springs
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: scattered clouds

In the morning we pick up three of Rooske's friends. We form a nice international group with three Dutchees (I know, that's not an actual word ; ), one German, one German/American and a Jordanian. Luckily we all speak English. We drive to Ma'in Hot Springs. "Nice", you think. Well, not really. The water was scalding hot and my feet turned lobster red within seconds. Apparently the thing to do was walk to the other side where it was less hot and stand underneath a cooler water fall. The problem however was that there were only males there and we (the four girls) weren't about to strip down to our bathing suits and mingle. There would have been way too much staring and it would have been uncomfortable for all of us (you have to remember that this is a mostly Islamic country and a lot of women are covered leaving only their faces unveiled). Anyway, our plan was to do some hiking and enjoy the beautiful canyon that way. Vague directions were supposed to get us to a trail. I had no idea where I was going but following Rooske eventually lead us to something that looked like a trail. We followed it for a bit but got stuck at a boiling hot stream. This would have been the kind of thing where an American National Park would place big warning signs telling you to keep to the trail and not risk any burn wounds. Rooske and Hani (the Jordanian dude) jumped over anyway dipping one foot in the water. Ouch!!! They told us to find another route. Opamp and Susanna did a balancing act on the unstable mud wall next to the stream and managed to get to the other side safely. I was no fan of the jumping or the balancing. Call me a wimp but I didn't want to get badly burnt or otherwise injured (hiking is my life remember?!). On our quest for a better way Juliana and I stumbled upon the real trail. What a lovely surprise! It even had trailmarkers. We followed the rocky ridge and had awesome views over the canyon and the beautiful waterfalls. There were two ropes draped along the big waterfall and I guess you could rappel down. We had actually watched one guy do it but seeing how they were only secured by a big rock and maybe with one bolt (note the maybe) we didn't venture down that way. Instead we continued our scenic walk high above and tried not to look down into the special bathing area for covered women. Just as we had left most of the noise and the people down below us and it was just us and nature the path ended and led us back down to the road. I would have loved to continue hiking but even this short stretch had been very cool. A little bit further down the creek we found a more secluded (and less hot) spot to bathe in. The surroundings were beautiful and the water was very pleasant. Too bad I couldn't quite forget about the guy who was cleaning his carpet in that same water just 200 yards up stream... The floating cans, plastic bags and empty coolers were a little distracting too...On our way back we stopped for a drink and a look at a nice mosaic in Mataba and then returned to Amman where we had excellent ice cream. We had voted for ice cream instead of driving up to Mt. Nebo because it was very hazy and the views would have been very limited. Besides, ice cream is very yummy ; )