Jordan's capital

The famous 6th century mosaic map of the middle east in Madaba

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Amman is a nice, mostly modern city. It was really tiny before 1948, and has grown alot since, springing up around the remains of the ancient Roman city of Philadelphia. It was nice to be in a big city again, full of amenities and bursting markets.

We made Amman a base for some daytrips around Jordan.  We visited Jerash, site of some impressive Roman ruins, and Madaba, a city famed for its Byzantine mosaics. We also visited Mt Nebo, where Moses saw the promised land and where he died. Unfortunately the view Mt Nebo lacked promise due to fog.

We also met a fun group of travellers at our hostel who we daytripped with. They had plenty of interesting stories, as some of them had just come from Georgia, Armenia, Iran and even Iraq (Kurdistan that is)! Apparently it is quite safe in northern Iraq, but we weren't convinced of that, so no worries we're not changing our itinerary.