Tales from Rohan

I went to the National Museum in Beirut today. This place has the best preserved early (Bronze Age through Roman Period) artifacts I have ever seen. The most amazing thing is that the museum was closed during the civil war and was heavily shelled (it was right on the Green Line separating the more Muslim West from the more Christian East). Before abandoning the museum, the staff packed away some small artifacts and poured giant slabs of concrete around some of the larger items (like sarcophogi) and burried the mosaics. The bulk of the medium sized artifacts were left down in the basement. Fifteen years later when the staff ventured down into the basement, they had to wear hazardous waste masks. The humidity in the basement was 92%. There was standing water everywhere and lots of bombs had exploded in the basement. Amazingly they managed to recover and restore a lot of amazing pieces.

Big Stuff:


Small artifacts that made it:

Some things that didn’t make it:

I have tons of pictures from Petra, so it was hard to pick a few.

walking into Petra early in the morning…

entering the siq…

first glimpse of the Treasury

But wait, there are hundreds and hundreds of buildings 

exploring the tombs makes you feel a bit like Indiana Jones (really that’s my shadow)

But you really need to walk along one of the other siqs…

And get up on top of the rocks to appreciate your new vantage point

Palmyra (or Tadmoor to the locals) is an extensive, well-preserved Roman city in the middle of the Syrian desert. It was once an oasis along the route between Bagdad and Damascus.

I also caught a nice glimpse of a herd of (wild?) camels drinking at a watering hole from the bus window.

I think anyone who has been to Jordan will agree that you need to be at least a little bit crazy to drive here. Fortunately, I qualify.  It was my last few days in Jordan so why not…

I rented a car for 3 days to see some of the sites that are difficult to reach using public transport. The result?  dipping feet in one international border (Jordan River with Israel/Palestine), 2 fun traveling companions, 920km, two beautiful nature reserves, 15 hitchhikers picked up, 5 castles, and only one warning from the speed control police.

Wadi Mujib and Wadi Dana Nature Reserves (more on these in another post)

Audrey and Muriel and I scrunched into the petite Kia Picanta (1100cc)

Dipping feet in the Jordan river (5m wide) literally spitting distance from Israel.

al-Azraq, al-Kharana, al-Amra, and Umm al-Jimr all out in the middle of some serious nowhere desert.

Everyone loves their mobile phones. Even camel drivers…

Hi-yaa!!! Sorry for the poor quality. I’ll see what I can do.

About three weeks ago, I started taking an Acroyoga class, and I am having a blast. Acroyoga is a mixture of yoga, acrobatics and Thai massage.

Here is picture of Jamie (the “base”) flying Melanie on his arms and Paige on his legs.

I’ll try to get more cool photos soon (with me in some of them even).

After visiting the Renaud’s in Des Moines, we stayed with our cousins in Boulder. Logan and Connor are just a bit younger than Alex.

Obviously this room is setup for teenagers. Connor was playing Alex’s guitar in the first picture.

Logan and Alex are demonstrating professional modeling poses. By all means, look off in random directions and look uninterested.

Melinda and Walt’s dog Olivia has a summer haircut

We also went to Greeley (Colorado) one afternoon to see my cousin Bethany and see Krista and clan on their home turf.

Finally, we went to Denver to have lunch with Heather, Mike, and Sophie