Petra takes a day. Jordan takes a week.
What the Treasury looks like at eight in the morning, before the coaches. What a night in a Wadi Rum camp actually costs. Whether the Dead Sea is worth a whole day or half of one. Reviews of every tour you can book in Jordan.
Petra, the desert, the lowest water on earth, and the Roman city nobody plans for.
The four days a first Jordan itinerary is built around. What each one costs, how long it really takes, and what the people who booked it said.
01Two days, three placesPetra, Wadi Rum, and Dead Sea 2-Day TourPetra, Wadi Rum and the Dead Sea out of Amman with one night on the road. The trip most people fly in for.
02The Petra dayPetra Full-Day Private Tour from AmmanOut of Amman before dawn, through the Siq by mid-morning, back long after dark. A private car makes the drive bearable.
03The night in the sandWadi Rum Full Day Jeep Tour + Overnight & Dinner in Bedouin CampA jeep run across Wadi Rum, dinner cooked under the ground, and a camp bed with the roof left open.
04The floatDead Sea Day Tour with Optional Entry Fees and LunchDown the valley to a shoreline 430 metres below the sea, with the resort entry and lunch settled before you go.
A day at Petra, a night in Wadi Rum, or both in one run. Pick your ground.
Everything below Amman is rock and sand, and the difference between the days is how long you stay out in it. Four shapes of day, what it costs to start each one, and how much driving it hides.
★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · Petra & Wadi Rum Private or group Day Tour
Petra in a dayThrough the Siq by mid-morning, out before the gate shuts.
A night in the desertJeep out at four, dinner from the sand, a camp bed after.
Half a day by 4x4Dunes, the canyons and the rock bridges, back before dark.
Sleeping outGoat-hair tents through to a dome you can see the stars from.
Every Petra day out →
Base yourself in Amman, then head south once the road opens up.
The capital on its seven hills, a Roman city an hour north with its streets still standing, the valley falling away to the lowest water on earth, and the two red places everyone came for. Six starting points, and the best day out in each.
The valley, the mosaic towns and the Roman city, all inside a day.
Amman sits an hour from a Roman city with its colonnades standing, an hour from the mosaic map at Madaba, and an hour from a shoreline 430 metres below the sea. Most people fit two of the three into one day and regret picking.
Amman is where you land, and it is worth more than the drive out.
Everything in Amman →
A Roman theatre cut into the hill, a citadel with a Umayyad palace on top, and a downtown of falafel counters and coffee roasters underneath both. Give it a morning on the way in and an evening on the way out.
The Citadel, then the theatre below it
The Temple of Hercules and the Umayyad palace share one hilltop, and the whole city reads out from the terrace edge. Walk down the far side and the Roman theatre is waiting at the bottom.
Downtown on foot, and what to eat there
Through the vegetable souk, the spice lanes and the knafeh counters on Hashemi Street, with a stop at the sweet shop that has been arguing about it since 1950. Best after five, when the heat drops.
Madaba, Mount Nebo and the valley view
A sixth-century mosaic map of the Holy Land on a church floor, then the ridge Moses is said to have looked out from. On a clear morning you can see the Jordan Valley and Jericho from the rail.
The days out more travellers take than anything else in Jordan.
All 303 Jordanian tours →What each one costs, how long it runs, and why it keeps selling long after the novelty should have worn off.
1
Petra, Wadi Rum, and Dead Sea 2-Day Tour
Travel from Amman to Petra, sleep in a Bedouin camp at Wadi Rum, ride through the desert by 4WD, and float in the Dead Sea. You can choose a classic or deluxe tent. Guides such as Jafar, Qutaibah, Majd, and Ahmed are praised for smooth driving, useful local advice, and good humor.
Read our review →
2
Petra & Wadi Rum Private or group Day Tour
from $126
3
Petra and Wadi rum Full day Tour
from $99
4
3-Day Private Tour from Amman: Petra, Wadi Rum, Dana, Aqaba, and Dead Sea
from $349
5
Petra Full-Day Private Tour from Amman
from $78
6
Wadi Rum Full Day Jeep Tour + Overnight & Dinner in Bedouin Camp
from $107
7
Jerash, Ajloun Castle or Umm Qais Private Tour
from $59
8
Petra & Wadi Rum: Full Day Private Tour with Hotel Pickup
from $133
The Treasury is the first thing you see and the smallest thing there.
The Siq opens on it after a kilometre of rock, and almost everyone stops there. The site keeps going for another hour: a colonnaded street, a theatre cut from the cliff, and 800 steps up to a facade twice the size, with the tea stall at the top and nobody else on it.
Every Petra day out →
What a day out in Jordan actually costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by price. The gap between a shared minibus and a private car with a driver is the single biggest decision you will make here.
City walks, the shorter desert runs, a dive off Aqaba and the half-days out of Amman.
- 1Morning or Sunset Jeep Tourfrom $46
- 2Bedouin Camp Stay,Full-Day Desert Tour with 3Mealsfrom $39
- 3Stargazing Adventure in Jordanfrom $30
The standard full days: Petra and back, the Dead Sea with entry included, Jerash and Ajloun together.
- 1Petra & Wadi Rum Private or group Day Tourfrom $126
- 2Petra and Wadi rum Full day Tourfrom $99
- 3Petra Full-Day Private Tour from Ammanfrom $78
Private drivers, two and three-day runs down the King's Highway, and the camps that come with a roof of glass.
Three things that only happen in Jordan.
Deserts and ruins turn up all over this region. A mile-long crack in a mountain with a treasury at the end of it, water you physically cannot sink in, and a valley floor that reads as another planet do not.
The walk in through the Siq
The gorge is a fault the water widened, 1.2 kilometres long and in places three metres across, with the Nabataean channels still cut along both walls. You walk it in near-dark with the sky a strip overhead, and the Treasury appears through a gap at the end rather than in front of you. Go in the first hour after the gate opens or the last two before it shuts; the middle of the day is a queue.
- 1Petra & Wadi Rum Private or group Day Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 750 reviews
- 2Petra Full-Day Private Tour from Amman★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 392 reviews
- 3Petra & Wadi Rum: Full Day Private Tour with Hotel Pickup★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 310 reviews
Water you cannot sink in
The surface sits about 430 metres below sea level and the water is roughly ten times saltier than the ocean, which is why you float on your back whether you meant to or not. Twenty minutes is the sensible limit, you do not put your face in it, and the resorts exist because you need a freshwater shower immediately afterwards. Every shaving cut will introduce itself.
- 1Dead Sea, Nebo, Madaba & Baptism Site Private or Group Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 190 reviews
- 2Dead Sea Day Tour with Optional Entry Fees and Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 154 reviews
- 3Day Trip to Madaba, Mt. Nebo, Baptism Site & Dead Sea★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 96 reviews
A night in Wadi Rum
Sandstone and granite standing seven hundred metres out of red sand, with Bedouin families holding the tourism rights inside the protected area. The jeep runs take the afternoon, dinner is a zarb buried in the sand for three hours, and the camps range from a goat-hair tent to a transparent dome. The cold after dark surprises people every single time.
- 1Petra & Wadi Rum Private or group Day Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 750 reviews
- 2Wadi Rum Full Day Jeep Tour + Overnight & Dinner in Bedouin Camp★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 368 reviews
- 3Petra & Wadi Rum: Full Day Private Tour with Hotel Pickup★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 310 reviews
Jordan owns twenty-six kilometres of coast, and all of it is reef.
The country touches the sea once, at the bottom of the map, and the drop-off starts a few metres out. Wrecks sunk on purpose, coral in twenty-eight degree water, and a glass-bottom boat for anyone who would rather stay dry. It is also the only place in Jordan where the day ends late.
Four Jordanian bookings that will not wait for you.
Most of this country can be arranged from a hotel desk the night before. These four run on a pass you must buy before you land, a season, a sunrise and a fixed number of beds.
- 01Petra Full-Day Private Tour from AmmanThe Jordan Pass is bought online before arrival. It waives the visa fee and covers Petra entry, but only if you stay at least three nights, and it cannot be bought after you land.
- 02Wadi Rum Full Day Jeep Tour + Overnight & Dinner in Bedouin CampCamps inside the protected area have a fixed number of beds and no overflow. Spring and autumn weekends are taken months out.
- 03Wadi Mujib Siq Trail with Amman Panoramic&Optional Dead Sea VisitThe Mujib Siq Trail runs roughly April to October. Outside the season the wadi floods without warning and the gate stays shut.
- 04Hot Air Balloon Flight at Wadi RumBalloons over the desert fly at sunrise and only when the wind allows, so the whole window is about an hour a day in a short season.
In July the answer is water, or a roof, by eleven in the morning.
Amman touches forty in the afternoon and the Wadi Rum sand holds the heat until midnight. Be out at six and be under something by noon: the Red Sea sits around twenty-eight degrees and shaded a few metres down, the Dead Sea resorts come with an umbrella and a cold shower, and the hot springs at Ma'in run warm in any month.
Jordan kept every castle anyone ever built on the road through it.
Roman forts, Umayyad hunting lodges out in the basalt desert, and two Crusader keeps on the King's Highway that Saladin took within a year of each other. Most sit an hour or two off the main run south, and most are nearly empty.
- 1Jerash, Ajloun Castle or Umm Qais Private Tourfrom $59
- 2Full-Day Tour: Umm Qais, Jerash, and Ajloun from Ammanfrom $89
- 3Private Tour of Ajlun and Jerashfrom $152
By place — the road from Amman to the Red Sea
By kind of day — rock, sand, salt or reef
Amman, Jerash, the valley, Petra, Wadi Rum, Aqaba: the week almost everybody does.
The newest Jordanian tour reviews.
The rest of the newcomers →
Petra And Little Petra Full Day Tour From Amman
Read our review →
3 Days Private Tour in Jordan: Discover The Best of Jordan.
Read our review →
Whispers of Stone, Sand & Sea: Jordan in Five Days
Read our review →
10 Hour Jeep Tour Pass, Camel, Sandbording & Lunch
Read our review →
Day Tour To Petra From Dead Sea or Queen Alia Airport
Read our review →
Wadi Rum 2-Day Jeep Tour with Meals and Overnight in Bedouin Camp
Read our review →
