Luxury Hotels

JORDAN JOTTINGS

Girlahead remembers so well magnificent visits to Jordan – above, a shot of INTERCONTINENTAL HOTEL AMMAN. Travel to the Hashemite Kingdom just got a whole lot easier, with visitors no longer needing a PCR test to enter this land of remarkable natural wonders, fascinating ancient ruins and breathtaking landscapes.

Small group specialist Jules Verne offers several escorted tours. Discover Jordan takes you on a nine-night journey, encompassing history and hospitality, souks and citadels, and desert dunes in sunset hues. You’ll visit the salt dense Dead Sea, and Aqaba, and the magical pink city of Petra.

So memories memories. Girlahead stayed once at THE FORUM HOTEL PETRA, and then GM Bill Eve invited her on a picnic high above Petra’s Treasury building. Unfortunately a goat carried all the necessities up and said animal bumped, seemingly intentionally, against the vertical highly-jagged rocks either side of the near-diagonal pathway.

End of the Laurent-Perrier, though the water bottles were unbroken.

Last time Girlahead went, that hotel had transitioned to Mövenpick. Then-CEO Jean-Gabriel Pérès’ high-impact houseparty, coincided with the worst snowstorm in Petra in living memory. Mrs P had the brilliant idea that all of us, dressed for sunnier climes, should borrow the plastic covers of our bathrobes. Heads through coat-hanger hole, arms cosy-warm by one’s body. We waddled around Petra-in-the-snow like penguins.

Girlahead could write a book about her memories of Petra, and Jordan, and InterContinental hotels. Suffice, now, to hear, again, Jane Mackie, here: