Known as one of the 7 modern wonders of the world this is a place that is usually ram packed with punters, well that is no longer the case with an empty Petra now being the norm.
And why is Petra empty? Well sadly because of the war in Gaza and Israel, despite the fact that Jordan is completely safe and for all intents not involved.
An empty Petra you say?
I could go on about the history of Petra for days, or you can read about it yourself on Wikipedia, but suffice tot say it is an amazing place to visit and as mentioned is a wonder of the world.
I therefore expected it to have some people, but alas that was not the case with the ticket office and the shopping area beyond being without anyone at all. This did pf course lead to the shipowners being even more “persuasive” then usual, but we persevered.
This lead us to a three hour, or so trip that took us to all the main places, such as the court, where we got to take not just epic, but empty of people photos. This will make sense when you see below.
Overall I would say I saw less than 50 other tourists there in the whole day, which might not exactly be an empty Petra, but when compared to the normality of thousands of people there is about as close as you can get.
In fact it reminded me of visiting an empty Angkor Wat during Covid-19.
Yet while much of this was great it made the usually blood thirsty sales people into crocodiles and rude ones at that. I guess I can best sum this up by a lady asked me to come to her shop by saying “hello looking is free”, I replied politely only to get “you do not want to support the women of Jordan” – I duly resisted saying that was perhaps her husbands hob and instead said she was rude and manipulative. I also though about all the cars in the museum too and how they could help, but hey I am apolitical.
The trip was duly finished with a Petra beer in Petra, which of course has a TikTok video.
The overall tourist scene in Jordan
In a few words pretty damned bad, with both Amman and the Dead Sea also being pretty dead. Overall my partners here have said at some places it is as low as 2 percent occupancy in hotels, which I will come back to later.
This is a crazy situation because as I have mentioned Jordan is safe and at best ambivalent about the war. This though does not matter, with the few guests I got for our SOFEX trip also facing heaving questions when telling people where they were going.
I can also confirm this with YPT and our various Middle-East Tours.
But if you want a top tip from someone who gets paid to travel; then I say this is the BEST time to go, with not only prices being low and attractions being much more empty, but also you are directly helping the economy. This is my experience at least is greatly appreciated by locals. Something I have seen in Ukraine among other places.
And the hotels in Petra
Whether you get a full or empty Petra there are still not just a bunch of hotels, but also many still being built as well as ours which opened just for us.
This was a somewhat surreal experience, with the restaurant just cooking for us, as well as all staff being there just to cater to our needs. They did though do a great job at the hotel, even if the pool was Arctic like.
Overall though it was a great experience and while it was a lucky one for us to see an empty Petra, I did no hope things get better for the benefit of the lovely people of not just Petra, but Jordan as a whole.