Jordan is small and mountainous and turns out to be an excellent walking country, a fact that has only recently been organised into infrastructure.
Dana Biosphere Reserve
The largest nature reserve in Jordan, 320 square kilometres, running from the highlands at 1500 m down to the Wadi Araba at 50 m below sea level. That gradient packs four biogeographic zones into one valley and supports more than 800 plant species and 200 bird species, including a substantial population of Nubian ibex. The stone village of Dana, largely abandoned in the 1960s and now partly restored, sits on the rim with a view straight down the wadi.
Walking in Dana
The Wadi Dana trail descends 14 km from the village to Feynan and takes five to six hours, one way and downhill, with a vehicle transfer back. Shorter loops such as the Rummana and White Dome trails start from the campsite. Guides are required on some routes and are booked at the visitor centre.
Feynan Ecolodge
At the bottom of the wadi, a lodge run for the Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature with no mains electricity: candles at night, solar hot water, staffed and supplied by the local Bedouin community. It sits beside one of the oldest copper mining landscapes in the world, worked from the Chalcolithic onwards, and the slag heaps are visible from the terrace.
Wadi Mujib
The Mujib Biosphere Reserve reaches the Dead Sea, and the Siq Trail is the reason to come: a wade and scramble up a canyon between walls a few metres apart, against the current, with ropes fixed at the waterfalls. It takes two to three hours return, you will be soaked, and it is open only from about April to October because of flash flood risk. Longer canyoning routes such as the Malaqi Trail require a guide.
The Jordan Trail
A waymarked route of about 675 km from Umm Qais in the north to Aqaba, divided into eight sections and typically walked over forty days, though most people take a section. The Dana to Petra stretch, five days ending with the back entrance into Petra past the Monastery, is widely considered one of the best treks in the Middle East. Community-run homestays and camps line the route.
Season
March to May and September to November. Summer in the low sections is dangerous, and winter brings snow to the highlands and flash floods to the canyons.