On a warm night in June, I was on a bus that would bring me to Wadi Rum, Jordan. I was excited to see this famous desert. In my mind, I already saw myself roasting marshmallows over a campfire, talking with others from my tour group till midnight. It would be the perfect end to a perfect day, which I'd spent exploring Petra and climbing to an illegal viewpoint. I couldn't wait to sit back and relax under an endless starry night sky.

When we arrived at our camp in Wadi Rum, I immediately knew that this was not going to be anything like the campgrounds I stayed at in the Australian Outback. Even though our travel brochure said we'd be staying in tents, we were housed in concrete housing blocks. Every apartment had a big bed and a bathroom. Nothing wrong with that, but when you're looking forward to camping underneath the stars, you don't want to spend the night in something that resembles a house this much. The adrenaline rush from climbing to Petra's illegal viewpoint disappeared the second I entered my room. I threw my luggage on one of the beds, threw myself on the other. I couldn't help but wonder what my time in Wadi Rum would look like after this disappointing start.

By the time I left my room again for dinner at the central pavilion, it was dark outside. Dark, but still there was no star to be seen. For some reason, the camp owners had put colored spotlights everywhere. Bright beams shot up at the sky. Light pollution made it impossible to see a single star, let alone the entire Milky Way. I sighed as I trudged through the sand. Loud music was playing at the pavilion and we'd barely finished dinner when a few Jordanian men invited everyone to come and dance. I felt like I was forced to enjoy an animation team's efforts as if I was on an all-inclusive holiday in Turkey. It was uncomfortable. All I wanted was to go to some quiet place and enjoy the desert's beauty. Instead, I was stuck in this overly commercialized camp. My friends in the group decided to leave the camp behind in search for stars, but I didn't go. There were dance parties all over the desert, as well as stray dogs. I like neither. I went to my room, wanting to be alone, but the thumping bass of the loud music that was played at the pavilion made it impossible for me to enjoy some quiet alone time. What was I doing here? I asked myself. How did I end up at this party camp? This was not what I wanted...

I cried that night, alone in my room. It was the only time I cried on that trip through Israel and Jordan and it didn't last very long, but it did make me realize this aspect of Wadi Rum really wasn't for me. I sat on the porch of my concrete box for a while after I'd stopped crying. Other members of our group came up to me to talk. Apparently I wasn't the only one who wasn't a fan of this 'camping trip in the desert'. I could only hope things would get better the next day, with a jeep safari planned, 

A good night's rest hadn't affected my opinion on Wadi Rum much. I spent as much time alone as possible before our jeep safari started. When it was time to leave, I climbed into the back of one of the jeeps, which turned out to be the slowest jeep I'd ever seen. We were the very last to arrive anywhere and I quickly got annoyed with our lack of speed and especially how close we were staying to civilization. The desert itself wasn't very impressive. I was told it once served as the set for Star Wars scenes, but these days it's more fit for a postapocalyptic or dystopian franchise due to the heavy plastic pollution. The highlight of this jeep safari was driving down a single sand dune. All of it was anticlimactic.

The turning point came when our group was split into two. Half went back to the camp, the other half had paid for an extended jeep safari. I was one of those who'd paid extra and that save my entire Wadi Rum experience.

I continued the safari in a faster car with a driver who understood our need for some action. He'd fall behind on the other jeeps, then slow down until my friend gave him what we called the 'speed sign'. The driver would floor it, race through the desert while I stood upright in the back of his jeep, basically tormenting the gods. The wind would tug at my hair and I'd scream for joy every time the driver swerved or flew over a minor bump in the road.

It wasn't just the increased speed that made me enjoy Wadi Rum more though. The extended safari led us further and further away from civilization. Now we got to see the desert's actual beauty, without tons of litter on the ground. We went to places that were indeed otherworldly as some places in the Star Wars franchise. I loved it there and wished I could have seen this part of the region sooner. 

Eventually the jeeps stopped near an arch. I was baffled. This wasn't just any arch, but the one you see in every single travel brochure for Jordan. I was over the moon that I actually got to see it in real life. And it got even better: I was allowed to climb it. After my little adventure in Petra, this was a piece of cake. Sitting on that arch, looking out over the desert, I felt truly blessed for getting the chance to be there.

The trip ended after a visit to another arch (which I also climbed, of course) and a visit to an ancient water well. I noticed that I didn't mind the disappointment that the previous night had been anymore, now that I'd gotten to see the desert the way I wanted to see it. We took a different route back to the camp and saw gorgeous rock formations along the way. We gave the driver the speed sign multiple times, each time enjoying it more and more. In the end, I accepted Wadi Rum for what it was: a polluted desert with too many parties to my taste. But Wadi Rum is also what you make of it: it's about climbing arches, exploring an alien world by jeep. A change in accommodation would have solved most of my issues, I now know. So no, my visit to Wadi Rum wasn't a waste of time. It was a lesson learned.