Ok, schools out and the adventure has begun! And what a beginning I got :)

Mans arrived on friday evening and I was meeting him at te airport. Thanks to a good friend and some Moda-magic, I didn't have to wait at the arrrivals hall, but in the immigration room, where he arrived fresh from the plane and very surprised to see me there :) That was not the only surprise, cause next I told him I had booked a room in a luxurious hotel at Dead Sea so that he wouldn't miss all the jewels of Jordan just because we would leave the next day to Syria. Well, we also decided to go to Wadi Mujib, the canyoning adventure the next morning and stay in Amman saturday night and leave to Syria first on Sunday morning, so that he could say that he's also seen something in Jordan. And cause I liked him to meet the school folks :)

A real surprise waited for us when we checked in to what I thought was the cheapest room of the Marriot Dead Sea, when the guy at the reception said we would be upgraded. Ok, cool, a bit bigger room, and he told it was with a nice view. But when we entered the room, sorry, the SUITE, I lost my breath: we got the Royal Suite with 5 rooms, kithen and sauna, large balcony looking over the pool area and the sea, massage table in bedroom... I was awestruck! So my surprise for him turned out to be a surprise to myself too. I still can't understand how that happened, from the cheapest littel room to the largest (it seemed, it was bigger than Mr Lewis suite in Pretty Woman ;). And the next morning breakfast with view over the sea, it was such a great start for a holiday! Also being apart for 4 weeks I don't think we had that much time to concentrate on the room, so the great surroundings were almost wasted hahaahah..

Well, saturday morning after the breakfast, and after buying new bikinis (I obviously forgot to pack mine in the hurry to the airport to meet Mans) I got my third dip in the Dead Sea. Mans tested how eyes react to the water, and he doesn't recommend! Other than taht it was a nice morning swim! Afterwards we met with our taxi driver Murad, and drove off to Wadi Mujab Nature Reserve, and took the trail up to the waterfall, it was as amazing and fun as teh first time. We met a French couple there and thanks to Mans waterproof camera we got some fun pics. Yeah, pics are coming later, no way uploading any with this slow connection here.

Back to Amman for saturday evening, meeting up with girls and some other ppl for last dinner at Jafra. Mmmm we managed to order all the best stuff, real nice food! Afterwards the plan was to meet up with rest of the guys in Jabal Amman, at Books@Cafe but to everyone's amazement the place was closed that day! So we went to La Calle. Such a great bar/lounge really liked the atmosphere and the funny stuff, really recommend that place! Also later in teh evening me and Mans and Lucas and Stephan got really hungry so we went to look for food, and arrived at Angelos
Pizza just up the Rainbow street. Obviously I had to mention the pizza dude that I make pizzas too, to what he responded by asking me to make a pizza... So there was I, in the pretty dress, hands in flour, trying to convince the others but probably mostly myself that my skillz were not gone! The dou he used was not as flexible, also he used a (don't kno0w whats it called, the wooden thing you make dou flat with..?) which my boss in Kotipizza would have murdered me for, and when I tried to roll it nice and throw the dou it broke... Well, anyhow, we got pizzas and mine with caper was delicious!

This morning, sunday, Boel, Mans and me packed into a taxi to Damascus (more convenient than a buss, and the price was not that much higher either cause we were almost a ful car). I was a bit nervous for the border check as I didn't have a visa ready like my Swedish travel company did, cause there's no embassy in Finland and they recommended me in sweden just to go to the border. Well everything went real smooth, I waited maybe 15 mins more than the others. And we were extremely happy we were not from US like the two guys sitting there waiting fo 8 hours! ooops...

Well in Damascus we checked into a hotel and have been strolling the streets of the Old City tonight, buying some souveniers, eating etc. Tomorrow the plan is to look at the city a bit more before taking the bus in the evening to Hama, where we will put up the camp for two nights to go see Krak des Chevaliers stronghold and the city of Hama. And then up north to Aleppo before heading to Turkey (me and Mans) and Damascus (Boel).

Well, take care and enjoy the rain ;) We enjoy teh sweatty moist heat here for everyone's account!