Spring birding at Azraq: a migration stopover for African-Eurasian flyway
March-April brings migrating waterfowl, harriers, eagles, and warblers to the Azraq Wetland — a critical stopover on the African-Eurasian f…
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The RSCN guided conservation tour at Dana: how Jordan saved its biggest reserve
The Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature runs guided ecology tours through the Dana Biosphere Reserve — the four climate zones, the…
The C-130 Hercules wreck, Aqaba: a 30-metre military cargo plane scuttled at 16 m for divers
In 2017, the Royal Jordanian Air Force scuttled a decommissioned C-130 Hercules transport plane in Aqaba's Underwater Military Museum. Now …
The Aqaba Saraya: the Mamluk-era fort that became a cinema and is now a museum
On the Aqaba seafront, the small Saraya building has been a Mamluk way-station, an Ottoman fort, a 1950s cinema, and a heritage museum — ea…
Azraq Wetland Reserve: the shrunken oasis at the heart of the eastern desert
Once a year-round wetland that supplied water to a 12,000 km² desert region, Azraq is now a fraction of its former self — but a critical mi…
Qasr Azraq: the basalt fortress where T.E. Lawrence wintered in 1917
Black basalt walls, a one-tonne stone door that pivots on palm-oil hinges, and the only oasis in 12,000 km² of desert. Lawrence used it as …
Dana Biosphere village: a 500-year-old stone village inside the largest nature reserve in Jordan
On the rim of the Dana valley sits a stone village that has been continuously occupied for 500 years. Below it: 308 km² of nature reserve d…
Bethany Beyond the Jordan: UNESCO baptism site, Byzantine churches, and a river now a stream
Inscribed by UNESCO in 2015 as the eastern-bank baptism site of Jesus, Al-Maghtas now contains five excavated churches, hermit caves, and a…
Shore snorkel at Tala Bay: the easiest way to see the Aqaba reef without a boat
If you don't dive, the same reef wall the divers descend is in 1–3 metres of water at the shoreline. Snorkel gear hire on the beach, no boa…
Aqaba Old Town: the souk, the Saraya cinema, and where to drink Bedouin coffee
Beyond the Aqaba beach hotels is a small but lived-in old town — a daily souk, the Mamluk-era fort on the corniche, and a handful of cafés …
