Petra...OMG!

Petra.
The Nabataens carved these temples, tombs and home out of the side of the sand stone mountains. These were carved in 400 BC. 
The Treasury and the Monestary are incredible to see.  The whole area took our breath away.
We spent 10 hours exploring Petra as the city itself covers 265 sq km of area.  We hiked up 2 mountains and covered about 20 kms.  Our guide loves Petra and took us all through the areas most people never see because of the climbing but as you can see it was worth every step. 
I don't have much to add to these pictures, they speak for themselves.



the first glimpse




The treasury

We hiked through the natural canyon where we could see all the different kinds of stone.  Red is iron, yellow is sulpher, and blue copper and the brown is sandstone.

Inside one of the tombs

the trail up the mountain



on the top of mountain #1

The view point above the monestary



The monestary which is 800 moutain stairs up from the valley and worth every step!  The people in the door give a good perspective as to how massive this structure is. 

Something I should add about these amazing sculptures, they were carved from the top to the bottom using a series of scalfolding.  We are told that there were no treasures found inside but our guide assured us that because they were tombs there would have been something of value inside.  Where those treasures went no one knows.

I believe they took whatever was inside but left the true treasure behind.