No.378 Of Water in Abundance & Short Supply

Day 2 and youngen is exhausted and is asleep in our room upstairs as I type this blog and ignore the last call to prayer of the day from the Mosque next door.

In truth we're both pretty tired and so's our driver Ibriham. For today we all did the length of Jordan top to bottom via the Dead Sea.

It was especially hard work for Ibi baby because it's Ramadam and he's fasting at the moment. This means he told us "No water, no food, no cigarettes and no of the other business between sunrise and sunset". By lunchtime today he confessed to feeling tired and weak which is why I kept a careful eye on him as he navigated his way first through the plains, then the desert then the mountain passes with huge drops either side between the Dead Sea and Petra.

It was hard too though for youngen and I because for much of the journey to keep himself awake he was listening to the same one tape of music. It sounded like a Jordanian Nana Mascouri in an awful lot of pain and the last 200 kilometres felt very very long.

It was 45 degrees today at the Dead Sea. Youngen and I must have sank at least 8 litres of water between us so how our guide managed the whole day without a drop I do not now. May be he's a human camel or something. Tomorrow I'll check for a hump on his back. He did stop near to the spot where allegedly Jesus was baptised by John the Baptist and soaked himself in water. I watched carefully to see if his tongue would come out to catch a precious drop of water while he thought no-one was watching but he didn't. Such discipline.

It's 8p.m. time to wake youngen go get some grub and treat Ibriham to a long slow drink.