I am a pilgirm not a tourist

Toursist go to many places, pilgrims are changed by the places they go to.

3/08/11

From -5 degrees on Tuesday to 35+ degrees Wednesday

Up early to meet my cousin and aunty Toos to take me to Schiphol. Was a sad farewell to Albert and Gerty, had a great time with them at my 5 star hotel and will miss them. Was really glad Jaqueline and Toos stayed with me until I went through the gate and waved until I could see them no more. Had watery eyes. Security was pretty tight going onto the plane and got padded down.

Was brilliant timing in Amman, Liz’s plane landed at the same rtime as mine and we found each other on the way to customs. Headed to the airport hotel – 4 star luxury and really friendly hospitality. Had a beaut buffet dinner trying all the middle eastern delights before calling it a day.

4/08/11

Let the pilgrimage begin

We got to the airport around 10am and I was hoping they hadn’t come through yet as I made welcome signs for Michael and Craig. Was like 2 minutes late!

 The bus headed to Bethany beyond the Jordan – the site of Jesus' baptism. Along the way we were instantly reminded we had been transported into another world – the architecture and the desert. The poverty was evident too with the rubbish, broken and run down housing shelters and seeing the tent cities of Bedouins. We also went past Mt Nebo, the place where Moses saw the promised land from and is buried somewhere around. It was hard trying to imagine a group of people walking in this hot land and finally reaching Mt Nebo and looking into the valley. 

We arrived at the site and it was so special to walk on sacred ground. We went down to the river and blessed ourselves with the water from the font. We had a special mass there, had goosebumps as the Gospel reading was about Jesus’ baptism and to picture it happening were we sat – incredible.

We then had some happy snaps before walking through some of the ancient churches built here over 1500 years ago. The steps to one church were still evident and our mad tour guide Emad told us that Jesus probably walked down those steps into the flowing river almost 2000 years ago. We had to pinch ourselves to remind ourselves that we were in the special place and to remember it.

Next we headed to the border check points – Jordanian was pretty straight forward, they didn’t check all our bags but we are now at the Israeli one and have been for over 2 hours. I was selected for a security check, bag check and pad down – yikes!