Petra was used as the location of the Grail Temple in the film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. In the movie, Indy has to travel through the canyon of the crescent shaped moon to get to the temple. And that's exactly what you have to do to get to Petra - travel through a canyon. (I don't think the canyon is actually crescent shaped but it is a canyon. Well technically it's a gorge. Whatever! It will do.)

The gorge is called al-Siq, which means the shaft in Arabic. It's quite narrow - only 3m wide in some places - and dark - the walls of the gorge tower above you and block most of the sunlight.

After walking for a couple of kilometres through the Siq, you round one last bend and can see that up ahead the light changes. It changes from shade to golden sunshine. At the end of the gorge there is just a tiny glimpse of the lost city of Petra.

You stumble out into the light and are greeted by an amazing sight, the Treasury (Al Khazneh), an impressive monument carved out of the cliff face (it's actually a tomb, like all the buildings carved into the rock at Petra). Emerging from the Siq you can imagine what it would be like to be an explorer stumbling upon a hidden city (well, you can if you ignore all the people who are stopping at the end of the gorge to have their photo taken, and the guys asking you if you want a camel ride.)

Petra is one of the new seven wonders of the world. You can definitely see why.

More photos (slideshow) of Petra on Flickr.

Our visit to Petra was part of our Road to Jordan tour. We did a 17-day tour with On The Go to Egypt and Jordan and we had a lot of fun. Other entries from this trip include: Petra - Beginning, Temple of Hatshepsut, More Egyptian Temples (Luxor and Karnak), The Tringles, Wadi Rum, Kom Ombo and Edfu, Feluccan Fun, Abu Simbel and The Dead Sea.