Petra - Aqaba (6.875 km)

yeah... lifes tough

its hard work riding in sand

its hard to describe the beauty here... but i think you get the idea. wadi rum desert.

Well we left petra in the morning around 9. drive through on the kings road to wadi. now wadi is a desert with beautiful red sand with red rocks. its a reserve so we had to pay to get in. a real one horse town and we arrived to chaos and our other biker friends running around..we asked what the deal was and they told us to find fuel and water quickly. were leaving in 30min for the desert! so we did. fuel from jerry cans and boom, i find myself looking straight into my first desert crossing. it was daunting and i was scared. having never ridden on sand before. sand is mighty tricky and the bike just goes everywhere. its like riding on jelly laced with oil. the place was just mind blowingly beautiful out there. ive never seen anything like it. it literally took my breath away. my first 600m i came off twice, and hard. i thought i was going to pass out from exhaustion. it was tough, much tougher than i thought. i let my tyre pressure down some more and then we kicked off! it all came to me for the next 40 km. and i only fell down twice in the last stage. so we made it.. our first desert crossing. sudan is going to be 100 times harder. having to cover 700km of sand with our luggage.

Martedi 04/12/2007 abbiamo raggiunto Michael, Werner, Tom e George che avevano campeggiato nella riserva di Wadi-Rum. Dopo aver comprato un po' di benzina da un beduino siamo entrati tutti e 6 nel deserto. George ha bucato la ruota anteriore dopo pochi chilometri ed e' dovuto tornare indietro, mentre noi 5 abbiamo fatto una cinquantina di chilometri in mezzo a dune e formazioni rocciose che per l'aspetto ricordano quelle che si vedono nei film di John Ford.

Questa per me e' stata una giornata speciale perche' abbiamo provato per la prima volta le moto nel deserto e perche' , nonostante qualche linea di febbre, mi sono divertito tantissimo.

Le multistrada se la sono cavata bene e, benche' montassero una ruota anteriore da 17", hanno tenuto il passo di moto attrezzate appositamente per il deserto e sono arrivate ad Aqaba (N 29 31,576' E 34 59,730') tutte intere (a parte la leva della frizione).

Colonna sonora: "Green onions" Booker T. & The MG's