Towns and Tourist Sites in Jordan -
The Dead Sea, Bethany, Mount Nebo, Dead Sea Panorama  and Khirbet al Mukhayat
Photo Jordan Tourist Board

Dead Sea

Photo Jordan Tourist Board

To get to the Dead Sea it is easiest to go from Amman. There are buses from Muhajrin station that take you to Sweymeh. Be careful not to miss the last bus back at 4pm or you will have to spend the night there and there is no budget accommodation available. (Note that the Dead Sea Resthouse has been closed for some time!)

However, there is now a bus route from Madaba which passes by Mount Nebo and connects at Shunieh with a bus for Sweymeh. There are several buses a day on this route which takes a bit less than an hour. At Shunieh it is also possible to get the bus to Amman, so you can do Amman - Dead Sea - Madaba (or vice versa) in one day if you like.

There are some good facilities for bathing at "Amman Beach" about 1km from the Dead Sea Spa Hotel which is closed. The entrance fee is 5JD, it offers facilities for changing, showers for getting rid of the salt, but nowhere safe to keep valuables while you are in the water. You can rent a towel for 1JD. You can also camp there overnight if this appeals - but there's no security of any kind and little privacy. Buses from Amman use their car park as a terminus, but tend to run on demand. There is a lot of demand on Fridays, but most of us would find it a bit too much of a good thing then.

This salt is very unpleasant on your skin, not to mention being bad for any clothes you will put on, so it is pretty well mandatory to be able to wash it off afterwards.

If the 5JD at Amman Beach is too expensive, I suggest you do what many locals do: keep on going down the road which eventually runs along the shore with the mountains rising immediately to your left. Along there you will find plenty of quiet spots to go down to the shore and bathe in the Dead Sea. To rinse off afterwards, keep going down the road until you come to a bridge over a stream which comes down a narrow gorge and enters the Dead Sea. The stream is very warm and fresh and well worth walking upriver a bit - climbing up the waterfalls can be good fun! This place is very popular - try to avoid Fridays!

You also have the possibility of bathing in the Dead Sea from the beach at Wadi Mujib (see the page on Wadi Mujib)

Note that swimming in the Dead Sea means that any abrasions or pimples will sting like fury and when you get water in your eyes they also sting a lot. Certainly floating is fun, but getting upright again isn't, you splash around quite a lot, and unless you are being very cautious you get water in your eyes all over again - DO NOT RUB THEM! The sea bottom is covered with slimy mud! Once is OK but next time I shall sit and watch other people going through all this. The Red Sea is better.

There is no budget sleeping accommodation anywhere near the Dead Sea, you would have to go to Madaba or to Amman (see note above about buses).

Bethany beyond the Jordan
These photos are copyright the Jordan Tourist Board

It was already known in 1940 that an interesting archaeological site existed in Wadi Kharrar, a small stream flowing into the River Jordan not far from the Allenby Bridge. With the coming of peace between Israel and Jordan in 1994, and the clearing of the landmines in this area, it became possible to undertake some serious research in this area, marked on the Madaba Map as "the place of willows".

The discoveries made surpassed all expectations. The key discoveries to date are the Byzantine monastery and Roman era remains at Tell el-Kharrar; several smaller churches, chapels, monks' hermitages, caves, and cells; a large Byzantine church complex adjacent to the Jordan River; an impressive ceramic pipeline bringing water to Bethany beyond the Jordan from several kilometres to the east; a large plastered pool and adjacent chapel halfway between the Bethany settlement and the Jordan River; a pilgrims' rest station and caravanserai east of Bethany, on the route to Mount Nebo; and other scattered remains whose function is not clear.  One of the most important sites recently found in the Middle East had been brought to light.

This site, conforming rigorously to descriptions by early travellers, was identified as the Biblical Bethany, where Martha and Mary lived, and where John the Baptist baptised Jesus. This identification was officially recognised in 2000 when it was visited by Pope John Paul II. The presence of distinctive local early Roman domestic pottery on the site's south plateau, confirming that the site was used at the time of Christ. Helena, the mother of Emperor Constantine, is said to have crossed the Jordan River and visited the cave where John the Baptist lived, and built a church there to commemorate him.

The hill has long been known as Elijah's Hill, or Jebel Mar Elias or Tell Mar Elias in Arabic due to the legend that it is  the place where  Elijah ascended to heaven in a whirlwind on a chariot and horses of fire, after having parted the waters of the Jordan River and walked across it with his anointed successor the Prophet Elisha.

The site is a large one, covering several square kilometers. the principal part of it is the Tell, (also called "Elijah's Hill"), where you can see several churches, three caves and three baptismal pools, together with the water supply, of channels leading from the two wells.

1. The mosaic floor of the main church.

2. The water cisterns

3. The cave and church of John the Baptist

4. The large baptismal pool

5. Wells

6. The church of John Paul II

7. Water channels

8. Prayer room

 Below the church, and running down to the river Jordan is a thicket of tamarisk trees, crossed by paths. Here is the Byzantine church built by the Empress Helena alongside two other churches of different periods. This is the area that the prophet Jeremiah called "the jungle of the Jordan" and the growth is lush here.

There is a Visitors' Centre (phone 05 359 0360) a couple of kilometers from the site itself, from where a system of minibuses can take you to it. You pay your 5JD at the gate across the road (you get a brochure with a decent site plan), then park in front of the Visitors Centre which has got souvenir shops, toilets, Dead Sea products etc. A free shuttle bus then takes people round the site every 15-20 mins, stopping at Parking 3 (for the church of St John, the new Greek Orthodox church and the river), Parking 2 (caves and baptism pools) and Parking 1 (Elijah's Hill and John Paul II church). The entrance fee includes a guide.

There is at the moment no public transport to this important site, but excursions can easily be arranged from Madaba.

 The "Dead Sea Panorama"

This is a new complex of restaurant and geological museum, high above the Dead Sea and between Hammamet Ma'in and Madaba. The museum is run by the RSCN, and has some fascinating information about the geology and the geological history of the surrounding area. As the name suggests it has a magnificent view of the Dead Sea and the hills beyond it. Watching the sunset from here is a wonderful experience, even if you just sit on a wall nearby. The restaurant is not cheap, but it is a very good place to treat yourself if you have a car. Be sure to reserve a table: even if it seems empty during the day, it is often crowded in the evening and can be completely booked out on Fridays.

No public transport goes anywhere near it, but it is possible to include it in an excursion to the Dead Sea itself: a new road has been built to give access from the Highway below, with a connecting spur to the road on the crest to Madaba and Hammamet Ma'in.

To my great regret I found it impossible to get a good photo of the view. Every time I have been there the hills opposite the Dead Sea have been wrapped in haze and the Dead Sea - almost vertically below, it seems - never comes out properly. I haven't given up!

Mount Nebo
(you can see more photos of Mount Nebo on the Photo Gallery page -
see also "Mosaics of the Madaba Plateau"))

Photo Leon and Mirjam

I love this particular place, a few miles out from Madaba on the new road to the Dead Sea. It has a most beautiful view, even in a country where beautiful views are frequent, looking out over the Jordan Valley. On a good day, one can see as far as Jerusalem, some 45kms away. Early in the morning is the best time for this. The very first time that I came to Jordan, I slipped away from the group I was with (not for the first or the last time, incidentally), and looked down, almost vertically, to where far below, a young boy was leading a flock of goats, and playing on what I now know to be called the "shababa". At the time, it was just a shepherd's pipe, sounding plaintively in the silence.

Unfortunately, the new road linking Madaba to the Dead Sea passes Mount Nebo, and the sight of the road and the sounds of the traffic straining to climb the hill do nothing nowadays to recall the Biblical landscape that I remember.

The church, administered by the Franciscan order, was much restored and repaired for the Pope's visit in 2000. There is now an impressive paved path from the main road. But the peaceful atmosphere of the church is still there. The site of the church and the viewpoint is open from 9am until 4pm.

At the moment (December 2007) and probably for the next couple of years, the church is being renovated and is not open to visitors. However, the complex in general is there, the view is just as beautiful and there is a new "mosaic museum" where the famous mosaics from the church have been placed temporarily. Mount Nebo is still most definitely worth a visit!

You will find a good restaurant nearby (the "Syagha Restaurant"), several souvenir shops with gorgeous hand blown glass "bubbles" which make lovely Christmas tree decorations, and a bit closer to Madaba, a huge handcrafts centre. This centre, contained in a hangar on the road to Mount Nebo and called the "Madaba Handicrafts Centre", offers huge commissions to guides and to drivers, so you will certainly be taken there! While the goods offered are perfectly respectable, these commissions come in the end from your pocket. Just don't be pushed into bypassing the shops in the town without having a look at them! In fact the commission paid by this shop is outright ripping off, and I strongly advise you NOT to buy there without having checked the price of similar articles in the town. I have heard of a painted ostrich egg sold for 350JD at the Handicraft Centre when the identical article of similar quality was on sale elsewhere for 180JD. The extra charge was largely, but not entirely, due to the commission paid. See my note in "Hard Facts" in the section on Ripping off.

Several fine mosaics have been found in the church (see the Photo Gallery - Mount Nebo page).

Khirbet al Mukhayat

Khirbet al Mukhayat is roughly between Madaba and Mount Nebo on a side road; it was originally the village near to the large Byzantine monastery of which the present Mount Nebo church is part of the basilica. (The church is shown on the map as "Siyagha".) If you are coming from Madaba you should turn to the left at al Faisaliya (named after Sheikh Faisal bin Jazi).

There are several churches, mostly pretty ruined. There is a beautiful mosaic in the "Martyrs' Church" of Saints Lot and Procupius but there are also 2 spectacular mosaics in Preacher John's church which are less well known

One of the mosaics was placed above the other one which was completely covered and unknown until the newer one was removed for restoring. The figures on the older mosaic have thus escaped the iconoclasts. These mosaics are very attractive.

Here you have the four best known mosaics from Khirbet al Mokhayat : On the left the one from the Church of Saint Lot and St Procupius, beside it the one from Baptistry; the two on the right are from the Church of Preacher John. You will see that first three are of generally similar styles. The later one from the Church of Preacher John is quite different.

Madaba

Information on Madaba, the mosaics there and the famous Mariam Hotel can now be found on a separate page.

"JORDANJUBILEE" is now available as a book, which is much more convenient for reference if you are travelling around. You can buy it online if you wish by clicking on our securized site, or it is on sale in a number of places in Jordan

Next

Page 1 : Amman - Jerash
Page 2 : The Dead Sea, - Mount Nebo
Page 3 : Madaba
Page 4 : The Kings' Highway, - Kerak, - Wadi Mujib - Dana
Page 5 : Ma'an, - Petra - Wadi Mousa
Page 6 : Aqaba

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©Ruth Caswell 2002