A short distance north of Petra, Jordan, lies an area of pale honey coloured rock – Al Beidha in Arabic, ‘the white one’ – the next most important site in Wadi Musa, also included in Petra's inscription as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Here in the 1st century AD the Nabataeans established a commercial suburb, a place for trading caravans to stop en route between south Arabia and the Mediterranean.
Photo Credit: Martin Charlton
NEW THINGS AND UPDATES!
A couple of special Tour Leader-designed trips, this time from the desk and imagination of Jonathan Hodgson. In addition to many of our regularly-scheduled he’ll be leading for us in 2017/18, Jonathan is excited to launch two new additions to the special “JH” series of itineraries:
Cradle Mountain, Tasmania’s iconic peak, is located in Cradle Mountain – Lake St. Clair National Park. This national park is home to the Overland Track, a famous hike that stretches 65 kilometres from Lake St. Clair to Cradle Mountain.
TOUR LEADER NEWS
The following Tour Leader assignments are for confirmed tours coming up soon with space available, as well as some new and exciting things a little further down the road. This list is not exhaustive—watch this space every couple of months for news about our leaders, simply the best in the business.
Tour Leader: Rachel Kristensen
In addition to our regular scheduled trips throughout the year, Jonathan Hodgson has designed a couple of new one-off trips that he will be leading late summer / fall:
ACCOMMODATION UPDATE
A traditional ger (Mongolian) or yurt (from the Turkic languages) is a portable, round tent covered with skins or felt and used as a dwelling by nomads in the steppes of Central Asia.
A Mongolian yurt, known locally as a ger, is a strong, portable tent-like structure that has been home to the nomads of Mongolia for at least three thousand years, and is able to withstand the harsh winters of this region.
The Mongolian Ger
The structure comprises an angled assembly or latticework of pieces of wood or bamboo for walls, a door frame, ribs, and a wheel (crown, compression ring), possibly steam-bent. The roof structure is often self-supporting, but large gers may have interior posts supporting the crown. The top of the wall of self-supporting gers is prevented from spreading by means of a tension band which opposes the force of the roof ribs. Modern gers may be permanently built on a wooden platform; they may use modern materials such as steam-bent wooden framing or metal framing, canvas or tarpaulin, plexiglas dome, wire rope, or radiant insulation.
THE ROADS LESS TRAVELED
"Two roads diverged in a wood and I - I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference." - Robert Frost
Before air travel became overly popular, it was easy to feel you were on the road less travelled. Since the development of the jet engine in the 1950s flying has become more commonplace, making it quicker and easier each year to see destinations you’ve been yearning over.
The Meroe Pyramids, sometimes referred to as the Nubian pyramids, are located along the banks of the Nile River in the lonely desert of eastern Sudan. There are nearly 200 known pyramids there, and they were built between 2,300 and 2,700 years ago, with many of the pyramids functioning as tombs for the royalty of the Meroitic kingdom.
However, that means everyone else has been able to get to those far flung destinations too. We all know the feeling of arriving and finding out that you are undoubtedly not alone. The unbearable throngs of people all trying to see that one monument, places bursting at the seams as unending streams of people flow in and out of its city walls.
Tour Leader & Staff News
To celebrate our 30th Anniversary, we have just assigned senior Tour Leader and destination specialist, Martin Charlton, to our iconic Egypt and Egypt / Jordan combo series for January 2017! This is where AA got it’s start, and Martin can’t wait to share one of his all-time favourite tours.
Tour Leader: Martin Charlton
Martin Charlton's tours
