Jordan 🇯🇴 - Day 10 & 11 - Aqaba and Dead Sea

Right after getting out of the desert, we drove straight over to Aqaba and the red sea.

Aqaba is a geopolitically very interesting area. It is right on the Red Sea, representing most of the 26 km access to these waters from Jordan. In the very small area that is the Gulf of Aqaba, Egypt, Israel, and Saudi Arabia all have a direct access to the Red Sea.

So from the coast where we were in Aqaba, we were directly looking at Israel and Egypt across the water.

Aqaba city itself isn't a very pleasant holiday area. It's very much centred around its port and the trade business–there're even customs checkpoints before getting to the city.

The South Beach part is a bit more pleasant, with beaches and access to the sea for swimming, and plenty of resorts.

Once again, the place we stayed at was booked the Jordanian way through Deifallah.

Before checking into the hotel, we stopped at the beach to swim, and we were pleasantly surprised to find lots of coral to snorkel around right off the shore.

We obviously didn't have the equipment for snorkelling, but there was a little shop on the beach renting out the masks, tuba and flippers.

After enjoying the sunset on the beach, we checked in to the hotel for the night, only a 2 minute drive from the beach. Even from our room the view was great. 😍

The next morning we left not too late so we had time to stop at the dead sea before needing to be at the airport in Amman at 4 for my flight.

I didn't really know what to expect of the dead sea, but I've got to say, the buoyancy in water was magical. We'd read before that it could sting a lot on open wounds or recently shaved skin because of the salt, but I didn't feel it that much.

Once you're in the water and you lift your feet off the ground, you immediately feel so light and weightless. The feeling is incredible.

We didn't want to pay too much to got in the water, so we just stopped on the side of the road where a man had set up a few chairs and a makeshift shower. We negotiated the price and he accepted 3JD (~4€) for the both of us.

We actually spent a bit more time than we expected in the water so we ended up having the rush a bit to shower and leave, but we got to the airport in time for my flight.