I'm starting this story in the same state I was in when my journey to Jordan began. Namely, during one of the tough moments of my life. It might seem like there are no major reasons for it, but close friends know that I've been complaining about insomnia and feeling unwell for a long time. Don't think I enjoy it myself, but my health has been failing way too often over the past year.
That's exactly what happened before the trip to Jordan — first, a couple of weeks of feeling like I had a fever (even though I didn't), and then it actually showed up (37.1). We had to leave at night, with the flight around seven in the morning. My mental state was terrible, as the trip plan was pretty ambitious and grueling: cross the entire country from north to south in ten days. When I bought the ticket, the plan wasn't clearly fleshed out yet, because it's not that simple to plan in advance what you want to see and how — sometimes you just have to take the plunge and dive headfirst into an ocean of probability. Moreover, when I made the decision to fly to Jordan, I was ready to travel even solo, and I didn't know if anyone else would fly with me. At that moment, I wanted to break out of the routine so badly, to see new people and places again, to hear foreign dialects and see different outfits, that I said screw it to all my fears and hit "buy ticket" before the impulse faded.
And just like in many other cases where I punched above my weight and stepped out of my comfort zone, I regret nothing. You play the hand you're dealt — among my friends and distant acquaintances, there are plenty of inspiring examples of someone overcoming seemingly harsh circumstances every single day of their life, and ultimately achieving meaningful goals and great heights.
As a friend of mine says, "maybe we are those kinds of friends to someone too." I suppose one couldn't ask for more.
But back to Jordan. In the weeks following the ticket purchase, I managed to lure in with my tall tales the optimistic and strong in body and spirit comrade Alexander Rybakov, hopefully already known to you from our trip to Cyprus.
Our trip was supposed to take place in November, to catch the Latvian Independence Day, and last for ten days. After discussions and Rybakov's requests, we decided to drop by the Dead Sea — but that required pulling off another daring endeavor. We were flying into the south of the country, to the resort city of Aqaba - but there were solid reasons to start the journey from the north, from the country's capital, Amman. The thing is, we found a ready-made route from a company that organizes MTB tours, and it looked well-thought-out and interesting. However, analyzing it revealed that we absolutely had to ride from north to south, because in that direction there would be a significant drop in elevation, and we wouldn't have to do an extra two or three kilometers of climbing. Which was very handy, since the route was already pretty ambitious in terms of physical load, with massive elevation gains almost every day. By my standards, of course — I'm no athlete, and sadly haven't been doing outdoor tourism since childhood.
But since we were flying into the south, it meant we immediately had to find transport to the north. The internet is only partially helpful here — as it turned out, the private transportation business in Jordan is built on the "any which way" principle, and isn't too keen on building websites. The only one that turned up was a serious company, Jett Bus, which I even called via Google Hangouts — to find out if they'd take bicycles. All they could tell me was "you'll be informed on the spot." Great, we'll be informed, but where are we going to go at 4 or 6 PM if everyone doing private chauffeuring in Aqaba leaves for Amman at 6-7 in the morning?
It was a deeply unpleasant moment, and we might have had to shell out a tidy sum to haul us and our bikes the 350 kilometers to Amman — but how it all got resolved, you'll only find out in the next episode.
For now, we're still talking about day zero, meaning the night from November 18th to the 19th. I finished packing everything I could according to a list tested by many trips, watched the fireworks on the square with friends, finished watching all the episodes of the funny animated series Rick&Morty, and sat waiting for my dad, who was supposed to drive us to Kaunas. The bikes had long been packed in very convenient massive boxes, kindly provided by Sergey from the Trek Veloserviss shop, right at the intersection near school No. 4 and the bazaar.
Maps downloaded into the navigators, a whole four devices capable of this between the two of us — my two Android phones, Sasha's tablet, and his tourist navigator. There are three types of maps — Bing, OpenStreetMap raster, and its vector version too (barely found one with English names). Hotel bookings and boarding passes printed in duplicate, one for me and one for Sasha, Jordanian contact numbers saved in our address books.
I have four types of painkillers with me, three types of strong antibiotics, but without dire need, I absolutely don't want to consume any of this — I'm still hoping everything will work itself out.
Dad, having fueled up on Diet Coke for a boost of energy (coffee genetically makes us jittery), drove us to Kaunas airport through a few traffic lights — roadwork. In some places, it's already perfect asphalt, while in others the car scrapes its underbelly on dirt road potholes, barely crawling behind the semi-trucks ahead. At the border (at 3 AM!), we get stopped by a Lithuanian border guard, and it turns out dad couldn't even fathom the thought of bringing his passport with him. Despite dad's complete disregard for the law enforcement officer and his casual communication style, he gets off with a verbal warning, for which a big thanks to the Lithuanian bros — rumor has it, our guys would have definitely written up a ticket, and maybe a 30-euro fine too.
A thought slips through my mind that, perhaps, we should have left a bit earlier. Outside, it's devilishly cold for me, and inside the car, it's too hot. Once we're there, I struggle to get out of the car, but it only seems that way. You can't just erase the hours spent at the gym from the record — we simultaneously haul the bags with supplies and the bike boxes, which we check into luggage without any hassle. I want to say thank you to Ryanair for our happy maturity — but I won't, because they charge more for transporting a bicycle than any other company in the world — 60 euros one way.
At the Kaunas airport, they sell cool wooden Salvador Dali magnets for 5 euros a pop, and so my squandering began right here. Fortunately, taught by experience, I bring an empty bottle with me so I can fill it from the tap in the bathroom if needed, rather than buying one in the shop for two euros. Unfortunately, the tap water tastes awful and is undrinkable.
We pass security and border control, which isn't as thorough this time around as the last one, when I was flying to the promised land. Unfortunately, this was compensated by the search on the return flight, but you won't be hearing about that for a good while.
Stay tuned! Sooner or later, new episodes will drop.