Welcome to the stories of a magical week in Jordan where we navigated the coolest parts of the King’s Highway for an unforgettable week of adventure!

Day 4: Wadi Rum – sunrise hike, jeep tour, Um Froth, Burdah Bridge, camel ride to ‘sunset spot’

The next day, we awoke for sunrise and walked to a cool overlook from Martian Camp.  I sat with a journal and watched a crazy camel walk in circles while Robb scoured some rocks (as Robb does).  It was totally worthwile.

Journaling at our chosen sunrise spot

We made it back to the Bedouin camp for a good breakfast and then caught our 4×4 tour at 8:30.  A note of caution: we booked the 4×4 through the camp, and didn’t verify the driver would speak English. He didn’t. He was lovely, but it was a bit frustrating to be without a map, without guidance, without internet to google it, etc.  As it was, we found a map on the ground by some amazing stroke of luck, listened to English speaking guides at the stops, and I spoke just enough Arabic to ask what things were.  

Robb scaling near the petroglyphs

Um Froth (mother’s bridge) is legitimately cool.  It’s super near the ‘parking spot,’ but at 15m high (with a perfect place to do headstands and splits for photos) with a doable path to the top for those with reasonable skill/courage, super fun. 

Typical antics . . . and our trusty desert vehicle in the background 🙂

Um Froth (mother’s bridge)

It was Burdah Bridge on Jabal Burdah that really pulled us in though!  It’s a 35m high bridge, about 500m up the mountain. It wasn’t in our ‘plan’ to go hike it, but when we laid eyes on it, Robb and I knew we had to.  It took some very creative communication with our Arabic-speaking guide, but with some combo of 1) my Arabic, 2) Google translate, and 3) a bilingual guide that came during our ‘chat’, we managed to convince him to take us to the base and trust us to find our way up. 

Burdah Bridge from afar – pic doesn’t do it justice – it looked soooo cool!

The route is well marked with cairns, arrows, and footsteps so a guide isn’t needed if your’e confident on rock. That said, it’s not a bad idea to have one for safety/direction if you don’t love the adventure of figuring things out on your own (which we kinda do). The round trip only took a few hours, and the views of Wadi Rum were astounding.  

On the lower flanks of the hike

The hike goes through super cool and scrambly terrain . . .

No shortage of adventure!

Approaching the ‘crux move’ before the final steps to the arch! It was definitely 5th class.

This Burdah Bridge hike was definitely the highlight of Wadi Rum for us, and it took the pressure off ‘seeing it all’ by seeing perhaps the coolest part, and getting great perspective.

Antics as always 🙂

From there, we enjoyed the drive back to the Martian Camp and then decided to do a camel ride to the ‘sunset spot’ for sunset . . . because, why not?

Appropriately named ‘sunset spot’

We then walked back to the Martian camp at dusk (hour ride, hour walk, totally great balance of sitting/moving and great to be out at final light watching the colors change on the rocks).  One more good dinner and great bonfire and it was off to sleep. 

More antics . . . 🙂

Stunning light for the walk back to camp

Really, it’s hard to do Wadi Rum justice, and we had fabulous day exploring it.  The place is worth a dedicated trip to explore for a few weeks, but if you’re on a time budget, it’s totally possible to have a rad experience in a short amount of time!