Jerash

Jerash was SO COOL!!! It was my first experience really with ancient ruins, I am just in awe of how detailed everything is, how many hours it must have taken to carve it all out of stone...man it's just amazing. There have been seven major earthquakes in the last I don't know like a thousand years or so, and many of the buildings and things have been demolished, but still their remains are there. They are just incredible, so much history it seems in every stone. It's very very cool. It was built by the Romans, hence the fancy columns and statues etc... SO cool!

Hadrian's Arch, massive. very detailed. Beautiful!

Debbie and me, BFF pic :)

Sitting on some of the ruins behind Hadrian's Arch

In front of Hadrian's Arch

The whole hippodrome, there was a play that we missed, that was a chariot race! COOL! We did get a picture with some of the costumed men though...

Debbie looking at the hippodrome

Some of the guards, they were laughing and waving, and they would smile and then go back behind their wall, then come back out and do it all again, they reminded me of shy flirtatious school girls...pretty funny.
This guard came over waving his sword, we were laughing at him, and he came over and put his arm around my waist, and started grunting HHMMMM through his mask. It was funny, showing off seemed to be his specialty

This is Justin at the end of the Hippodrome, outside these arches is a great view of what is modern Jerash.

A bird, don't know what kind, just thought this was a cool photo with the pillars from the forum in the background

A storage place next to the hippodrome, cool arches

The South Gate of Jerash

detail of the carving on top of a column, with the forum in the background

The Temple of Artemis

The faces of these carvings have weathered away, and where they once stood on top of the massive buildings, they now sit on the ground. I don't know if you can tell but the one closest was a lion, you can kind-of see the tail...

These guys were playing Scottish traditional songs on the bagpipes...talk about out of place! Debbie said though that Jordan was part of British mandate or something waaaay back when, so maybe it's not that out of place. The acoustics in the amphitheater are awesome!

The stage, so many entrances, so cool!

The amphitheater rows and rows and rows...

Backstage of the theater