Jordan has many incredible locations. Petra and the wadi rum desert are the most known, but there is much more than that. This land had an eventful history and

Jordan has many incredible locations. Petra and the wadi rum desert are the most known, but there is much more than that. This land had an eventful history and that shows (from roman ruins to ancient muslim castles). It is also detached from most conflicts in the region. We went there with my girlfriend around the beginning of the year. It was a very nice trip as a whole, but I feel obliged to express my discontent about how aggressive are the merchants and salespeople at the touristic places there. You very much feel like you're seen as a walking wallet when you're walking in Petra and the huge amount of merchants selling souvenirs there - inside the site (which is an unpleasant sight on its own) - begin to talk to you uninvited to convince you to buy their stuff. Same thing for wadi rum, when you see how the different "bedouin guides" are neatly organized to sell you an "experience". It sadly feels very unauthentic at the moment when you're looking for the opposite. For sure that's something to be expected from most touristic places in the world, but I felt that this behavior was particularly present there. As a whole, I found relation to local people you depend on (to eat, to move, to sleep or to visit) to be hit or miss, with a lot of misses (but also two incredibly nice guys on two separate occasions, so I cannot generalize). Just to compare with a neighboring country, I also visited the Palestinian territories a few year before and did not have the same experience at all, quite the contrary even. That was just my experience and I know someone who also visited there around the same time with a better experience. She rented a car (we used local buses), and stayed less time in the most touristic places but much more time than us in the north. I would advice people wanting to plan a trip there to do the same thing. The last day, we payed an expensive guide for a tour in the remaining locations we did not have time to visit. This guide was helpful and it was a more relaxing day than the rest of our trip (which lasted around 10 days, I don't remember exactly), so I guess having a local guide also helps. \End of my rant about the caveat of tourism in Jordan