"You want to go ahead?" our Jordanian guide shouted down the path to my friends and me early in the morning.

"Yes!" we shouted back. We were already thirty meters ahead of the group and, with all due respect, we did not want to walk to Petra with these slow people. Sticking with them would definitely ruin our chances of taking any good pictures of Al Khazneh, the legendary Treasury. The place would be crawling with tourists by the time our group would get there. Besides, my friends and I wanted to hike to Ad Deir, the Monastery, and had been told we'd need our time for that.

"Okay, go ahead!" Our guide gave us the green light and we bolted off.

Even though all three of us had been to Petra the night before, when the Treasury was lit up by countless candles just like it is in all the pictures in travel brochures for Jordan, the walk to the rose-red city was every bit as fascinating by day as it had been by night. Now we were able to see all the Nabatean ruins on both sides of the path that led us to the Siq. We discovered something new around every corner. Once inside the Siq, the small gorge that leads to Al Khazneh, our eyes started playing tricks on us. Every weird and odd shape along the walls of the gorge could have been part of a Nabatean structure. We noticed carvings and water basins we'd walked straight past the night before. I took dozens of pictures; every pebble there was interesting by daylight.

After 2 kilometers, we emerged from the Siq and found ourselves in front of the Treasury. It was still quite peaceful; very few tourists had made it to Petra before us. Still, taking a decent picture proved to be a challenge. The sunlight and shadows in the gorge made it difficult to capture the image as beautifully as our eyes did. Since we couldn't get the pictures we wanted, we decided to start walking to Ad Deir right away. That was the moment I discovered Petra was way different from the way I'd imagined it. For the longest time I, like many other people, had thought that the Treasury was Petra. All of it. Even though I knew that to be false at the time of my visit, I still thought the entire city was situated inside small canyons and gorges. This turned out to be false too. Soon after we left the Treasury behind, we entered a huge open plain full of Nabatean ruins. While it was very beautiful, it was also very hot and I burned to a crisp in no time; I hadn't even taken sunscreen with me, as I'd expected to be in shadowy canyons all day...

Though we all agreed that the ruins were gorgeous, we walked briskly past them. Our destination was still far away: first we had to find the right path (quite the challenge with no signs or markers along the route), then climb anywhere between 700 to 1000 steps. Up until the restaurants at the start of the climb, everything went great. The path to the climb was more or less hidden behind a building, so we first doubtingly followed another trail until we saw more tourists and a camel disappear behind the building. We followed them, accompanied by a mule called Erdogan.

The first couple of hundred meters didn't pose any real problem. There were some steps, but most of the trail was level. We strayed from the path once, when we spotted the Lion Triclinium. I still have no idea if we were allowed to leave the path and almost climb up to this ruin, but we did it anyway.

After this slight detour, we continued our way to Ad Deir. Temperatures were rising quickly now. My drinking water disappeared faster than I'd expected. Then we were confronted with the steps. All 700 - or 1000, depending on whom you ask - of them.

We walked mostly in silence as breathing became more difficult. Looking back on it now, it's almost scary: Temperatures rising up to 40 degrees Celsius and no drinking water. Luckily we soon saw little stalls by the side of the track, where we could buy souvenirs and, way more important, water. We took breaks to drink whenever we could find a place that offered some shade. We also used those moments to look around in awe and say: "It sure is beautiful though." I think we said those words a hundred times that day, but they're true: the rock desert around Petra will kill you if you're careless, but it sure is beautiful.

After what felt like hours, hundreds of steps and a few false alarms when we mistook souvenir stalls for our destination, the path finally flattened out. We'd made it to Ad Deir. The climb had been breath-taking, both literally and figuratively, and when we finally made it to the Monastery, we knew it had all been worth it. We found ourselves standing in front of another gorgeous facade. All we said was: "It sure is beautiful though." I enjoyed those moments immensely. Ad Deir isn't as well-known as Al Khazneh, but at least as amazing. There are also way less tourists that visit this monumental ruin, so I could take my time to take it all in. The facade mesmerized me, its far-off and hard to reach location made it even more special.

Eventually we sat down for a cup of tea at the small restaurant opposite Ad Deir. My brain couldn't quite process the beauty of the desert, the ruins, everything. It was still early in the morning. Little did I know that this was still only the beginning of my Nabatean adventures.

To be continued...

'What's so special about Amsterdam?' I murmured to myself on October 13th as my train rolled into Amsterdam Central Station. It wasn't my first time in my country's capital, but my visit in May hadn't been able to show me why so many tourists love the city. In fact, it had only shown me why people in the Rotterdam area, where I'm from, always say that the best thing about Amsterdam is the train back home. On that day in May, a Frenchmen on a bicycle had almost crashed into me and I'd lost count of the number of suitcases that had been pushed against my shins.

So why did I visit Amsterdam again so soon, you ask? Good question. You see, a few weeks ago, an invitation for Strawberry Tours Amsterdam's press tour had landed in my inbox. I accepted and Strawberry Tours got themselves a challenge: convince me and my Rotterdam roots that Amsterdam is awesome.

A few minutes after I got off the train, I met up with Annaleid from Actually Anna just outside Central Station and together we went to the I Amsterdam Visitor Center on Stationsplein, the starting point of our tour. Here we met up with our guide Niek, who grew up in the city and knows it like the back of his hand. A little while later we were joined by Nienke from Strange Towns and her boyfriend Ben. Our little group was complete: we were ready for our Undiscovered Amsterdam Tour. With a length of 6,8 kilometers, it's the longest tour Strawberry Tours offers in Amsterdam. In the following hours, we'd be walking through the less crowded parts where very few tourists ever come. On a day as sunny as that Saturday was, this turned out to be nothing but perfect.

Our first stop, however, wasn't very far away from the crowds. In fact, we were still right in the middle of the masses on Stationsplein when Niek told us about the almost 9000 poles and approximately 40 corpses underneath Amsterdam Central Station. The Undiscovered Amsterdam tour wasn't just about the hidden gems of the city, but also about its (slightly dark) history.

We continued our way to the 'bicycle flat' and 'bicycle boat', places where people can park their bikes. To us Dutch people, that's all very normal and unnoticeable. Until you go on a tour of your capital, when you suddenly see the place through a tourist's eyes. Suddenly my own culture became a whole lot more interesting.

We left Stationsplein behind and headed for the IJ, the river dividing Amsterdam in a northern and southern part. At the waterfront, I found the most morbid piece of street art I'd ever seen: a dead body swinging from a tree. Although still morbid, this made so much sense when Niek told us that the northern part of Amsterdam used to be a prison colony, where criminals were hung. Yup, definitely not shying away from the nasty parts of the city's history.

We walked on and left the hustle and bustle of the streets around Central Station behind. Soon we found ourselves in a part of town that I'd almost call calm (at least compared to where we'd come from). Here we talked about our national cuisine: cheese and herring. Of course we also passed a few coffee shops (I mean the weed-selling kind, not the Starbucks type); an Amsterdam tour would not be complete without them. Niek told us all about herring, why the Dutch always eat it with onions, and the confusing facts behind our coffee shop system. On a subconscious level, I knew weed isn't actually completely legal the way tourists think it is. On a more conscious level, I got a wake-up call when we discussed all the vague laws and rules that most people visiting Amsterdam rarely realize exist.

After this moment of realizing how weird weed legislation is in my country, we headed for a canal that's apparently famous because of an Ikea product (don't ask me about the details, I haven't been to Ikea in 10 years). I internally died laughing when wheelie bins we decided to move wheelie bins to the other side of the street just so we could take decent pictures. Stereotypical bloggers on a press tour, you know.

Don't worry, when we were done, the wheelie bins returned to their original position right next to the red bicycle. It was in a quiet street a few meters away from our picture spot that we made our next stop. We'd arrived at the West-Indisch Huis (West India House), where the Dutch West India Company had had its headquarters. While the VOC (our version of the East India Company) focused on herbs and spices in Asia, the West India Company also had a part in the slave trade. Niek told us about this without shying away from harsh truths, and this is one of the things I appreciated most about the tour. You don't get the romanticized version of Amsterdam and its history, but neither will you get a pessimistic sob story. You'll learn about the city the way it is, the good parts and the bad, the way it once was and the way it now really is.

We were not even halfway and my opinion of Amsterdam was already changing. Sure, I still disliked the enormous masses around places like the Anne Frank House, but we avoided the crowds. Instead of going to the known tourist traps, we walked along quieter but still beautiful canals and visited a market (where I balanced on the verge of a panic attack because there were so many people there that day and no quick escape route and help). This market was the only extremely crowded place we visited, but a lot of the people there were locals who'd decided to make the best out of that sunny day. Afterwards, I got the chance to catch my breath and calm down at the Karthuizerhof, a calm oasis in the busy capital. This place used to be a refuge for widowed and unmarried women who had nowhere else to go. The courtyard was stunning and I easily could have spent all day there with a good book and some tea. Sadly, that isn't an option, as there are still people living in this monumental building.

Another short picture break later, we started the last part of our tour, which led us past the Anne Frank House, the Gay Monument and the Amsterdam Museum. We paid a visit to the latter to look at an exhibition that shows Amsterdam through the eyes of the former mayor, who was immensely popular and passed away last year. It made quite an impression on me, as you could sense how much this man had cared about his city. 

We ended our day at a restaurant on a street called Gebed Zonder End (Never-ending Prayer). This street used to be full of nunneries and monasteries, hence the funny name. I'd highly recommend going here if you're hungry after a walking tour. We went to Kapitein Zeppos, which I absolutely loved. It's the most colorful place I've been to in ages and has an almost tropical vibe.

While I was busy munching on a delicious sandwich, I realized it was time to come up with my verdict on the city. Rotterdam roots are hard to convince when it comes to the rival city of Amsterdam. But now I realized I couldn't really think of a good reason to dislike the Dutch capital, and a lot of that had to do with Niek and his Strawberry Tours branch. The company works on a 'pay what you feel like' principle, which is always great when you're a broke student like me, and of course they have great guides, but what really set them apart for me was their realistic depiction of the city and their Strawberry Promise: every branch of Strawberry Tours donates a percentage of their revenue to a charity of their choice. Strawberry Tours Amsterdam chose Plastic Whale, a charity that fishes plastic waste out of the Dutch canals. If you know me and my hatred towards single-use plastics, you'll understand how happy this made me. And of course there was the route we'd walked that day, which also helped to change my opinion on Amsterdam. We'd really stayed away from all those places tourists flock too. I hope more of those tourists will do an Undiscovered Amsterdam tour to catch a glimpse of the city's true nature. It really is a unique and awesome place (except for when French guys on bikes almost crash into you; I will never let that go).

So did the tour convince me that Amsterdam isn't all that bad? Yes. Yes, it did. I personally think the Undiscovered Amsterdam tour and I were a perfect match, since I don't like glorified and overcrowded tourist traps. But if busy city centers are your thing and you want to get that typical Amsterdam experience, Strawberry Tours still got you covered: they also offer a Red Light District tour, a Historical Centre tour and a Live Music tour. Whichever you choose, I'm sure you'll have a great time and see Amsterdam as you've never seen it before!

At 18, I was swept away by a wave of existential fear. I was afraid I'd look back on my life in 50 years and regret all the chances I didn't take. So I started taking my chances, shouting YES whenever I got the opportunity to see or do something unique. This is why I didn't hesitate, not even a second, when my tour guide in Jordan offered our group the chance to visit Petra by night. It would set me back about $20, but I couldn't care less about that money. For days, I dreamed of seeing Petra's world-famous Treasury in the moonlight. I couldn't wait to see that dream come true.

By the time we arrived at Wadi Musa, near Petra, I wasn't very excited about my plans for a nightly visit to the rose-red city anymore. I was extremely carsick, on the verge of throwing up. Normally I don't get carsick all that easily, but the bus ride down the King's Highway from Madaba to Wadi Musa had seriously messed with me. I was white as a cloth. My friends had to carry my luggage to my room for me, and had I been on that bus any longer, they would have had to carry me too.
In the hours that followed, I did nothing but stare at the ceiling. I had to recover quickly, or I wouldn't be able to visit Petra that night. That thought almost made me cry. From a very young age, I had been told about how special the place was. My dad was - and still is - fascinated by the place. He hasn't been there yet though, which made me realize just how lucky I was to get the chance to see that capital of the Nabatean Kingdom by night. Petra is open to the public every day, but only three nights a week: every Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Had we arrived a day later, a nightly visit would have been impossible. So I laid down and waited for the carsickness to pass.

Three hours and a chocolate bar later, I got up to my feet and walked down to the lobby as if nothing had ever happened. It was time to visit Petra.
I met up with my friends outside the hotel and we followed the tour guide to the Visitor Center. I'd mentally prepared myself for a long walk, but the Center and entrance to Petra Archeological Park turned out to be a five-minute walk away from the hotel.
Waiting in front of the iron gates of the park made me restless. More and more people joined the crowd, along with a few stray dogs. Now I'm very much afraid of dogs, especially stray dogs, so I was extremely jumpy by the time the gates were opened. I guess that jumpiness had a positive side as well, because I shot forward and was among the first to enter the route to Petra.
My friends and I walked quickly. Petra by Night is quite the mass event and we did not want to get locked in by the crowd, not being able to see anything. We walked past a lot of people on the path toward the Siq, the small 2-kilometer long gorge that leads to Petra's Treasury. Our path was lit by hundreds of candle in brown paper bags, which looked like tiny lanterns. It looked amazing. I wanted to take at least a hundred pictures of the path, but the sun had already set and my camera could capture neither the image, not the atmosphere the candles created. I put the camera back in my bag and decided to just take it all in without electronic devices to distract me. There was so much to see, yet so much was also cast in shadows. I tried to make something out, tried to find the outlines of ancient ruins in this landscape that made me feel like I was in a Star Wars movie. I tried to imagine what this path had been like 2000 years ago, when Petra was the capital of a thriving kingdom. This was the entrance route for caravans two millennia ago. Now I was walking down that very same path in 2018, but the present had never felt so far away.

After a couple of minutes, we entered the Siq. The moonlight didn't reach us down in the small gorge, but here too our path was bathing in candlelight. There was a mysterious feeling radiating from the Siq, which made me giddy and excited. By then, very few tourists were ahead of us, so we walked a little more slowly down the ancient path. I'd expected it to be all soft and sandy, but here and there it actually resembled a modern pavement. I almost twisted my ankle once when a stray dog popped up out of nowhere, and I stopped paying attention to where I was putting my feet. Lucky for me, the stray dogs in the Siq are so used to awkward tourists like me that they didn't do much more than walk alongside us (though that still made me jumpy).
The Siq's many twist and turns made me lose all sense of direction and time. After a while, I expected the Treasury to be behind every corner we turned. Each time we were greeted by another stretch of candle-lit Siq. Then we rounded yet another corner, walked straight ahead for about 15 meters and all of a sudden we were out in the open again, right in front of the enormous facade of Al Khazneh, Petra's Treasury. I almost choked on the air in my lungs when I saw its columns, friezes and statues all lit-up by dozens upon dozens of candles.


A local came up to us and invited us to take a seat on one of the mats at the edge of the sea of candles in front of the Treasury. Walking fast had resulted in front-row seats, just a bit to the right of the very middle of the place. Since we were so early, we had to wait until all the other tourists had come out of the Siq. This time was spent trying to take the perfect picture of Al Khazneh. I received a crash course in ISO, but still managed to ruin a fair amount of pictures by picking my camera up way too soon. I was so focused on my camera that I barely noticed that one of the lanterns went up in flames less than a foot away from me. When I eventually did notice, I panicked for all of 30 seconds, then returned to capturing the mysterious world of Petra on camera.

Music started playing as the last tourists scuttled out of the gorge. The air felt thick with wonder. The music and singing that followed were majorly off-key every now and then, but it didn't bother me. When the music stopped, a man stepped forward and welcomed us to his rose-red city of Petra. Cups of tea were handed out. The whole thing reminded me of Middle Eastern fairy tales, which had always interested me more than their European cousins. I felt like I was living in one of those stories for a brief moment.
Then the spotlights were turned on. The Treasury lit up in blue, purple, green and red. Especially the red light made everything look magical. That special moment didn't last very long though, as tourists rushed up to Al Khazneh for that one picture to share on Facebook to make friends and family jealous. But who am I to judge? Soon I stood there too, posing for a picture that would forever remind me of one of the most magical moments of my life.


At the end of the night, my friends and I were among the last to walk back through the Siq. We let as many people as possible enter the gorge before us, then walked very slowly behind one of the last groups. At this point a lot of people were using their phones as flashlights, ruining the mysterious atmosphere inside the Siq. We tried to stay away from them and took our time soaking up every little detail of our nightly visit. It was getting close to midnight when I finally got back to my room, but sleep was the last thing on my mind. My head was spinning with images and experiences. I couldn't quite believe yet that I'd seen Petra's Treasury. I went through the pictures a thousand times, wondering what the place would look like by day. I was only a few hours of sleep away from my daytime visit to the legendary Nabatean city. I set my alarm, praying to hear it go off soon so I could pay another visit to Petra.