Sunset at a Dead Sea Resort
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A Memorable Day Trip to the Dead Sea

ByAdam Watts

Last Updated on April 13, 2024 by Adam Watts

While staying in a hostel in Amman, Jordan, I ended up doing a day trip to the Dead Sea with the hostel owner and his family. I say day trip, but Khaled assured me it’d be best if we left about three in the afternoon. “Too hot, too hot,” he told me repeatedly. “During morning it okay but at 12 it too hot even for us. You pale, you fry like egg.” The Jordanian hostel owner grinned at me as I sat in the hostel’s communal area next to the breeze of a fan.

If Khaled hadn’t been so damnably nice and if he wasn’t going to take me on a day trip to the Dead Sea later, I might’ve been annoyed. I’d been in this part of the world for over a month now and I thought my skin was taking on a nice healthy UV-blasted tone. Here’s a picture of me from Petra the day before:

Looking Over Petra

I passed the early afternoon wandering the area around the hostel, which was located in the center of the city. Everything seemed bland now. The market/souk crowds were a nuisance rather than the fascinating hustle and bustle that they had been in Jerusalem and Akko. I just wanted to elbow everyone in the ribs and step on as many toes as I could. And that one guy who smashed right into me in a rush to buy his pastries? I wanted to ram that piece of cake right up his–

Would you look at that? Nearly three already! I stopped dreaming up ways of murdering these probably lovely Jordanians and headed back to the hostel.

Leaving for the Dead Sea

Khaled was on the stairs and babbled to me, “Come! Come! Hurry!” so I raced up the stairs, shoved a towel and some swim shorts in my backpack, and headed back out into the heat. Thankfully Khaled’s car was air-conditioned. It seemed to be the only thing that did work, although the radio did cooperate after a few swift thumps. “Piece of– how do you say in English?”

“Trash?”

“Piece of shit, yes.”

I shrugged. We drove out of the city to a little suburb. He lived with his family in a really cute neighborhood, a very “American dream” kind of area, if America was middle-eastern and Arabic-speaking. Get your head around that one, rednecks. We changed cars to something a little more functional and practical, a silver seven-seater Nissan. I turned around in my seat and was surprised to notice two little girls and a wife sitting behind me.

“Oh, err, hi,” I said.

“Hello English,” the little girls said. The wife just looked at me like I was some kind of museum curiosity, a Roman jug perhaps, or maybe a 5th-century Japanese bowl.

We drove for 20 minutes and then Khaled stopped the car in a two-lane road. He didn’t pull to one side or anything, just stopped in his lane. He got out and went into the tiny store that was basically a big metal shed by the side of the road. He came back out with a bunch of bananas and a handful of ice creams. He gave us all one of each. No, wait, he gave me an ice cream and two bananas. Quite a number of car horns were blaring behind us but Khaled stood in front of the car and waved happily at everyone.

I should mention here that I was paying the petrol money that enabled Khaled to take his family out for this day trip to the Dead Sea. Quite a lot of petrol money, I might add, but if it was paying for ice creams for us all I wasn’t going to begrudge him anything — a child’s smile is one of life’s most beautiful things, particularly if there’s ice cream smeared around it. Aww.

At the Dead Sea Resort

Walking to the Dead Sea

We got to the Dead Sea resort and I was stung for $16. Jordanians get in for $1 apiece and kids were probably free. It’s a good system I suppose but it’s hard not to resent that price difference, especially when you’re on a tight budget. I headed down to the Dead Sea itself and left Khaled and his family at the swimming pool — his wife and kids apparently hated the salinity since it burns if it touches your eye.

I hopped into the changing rooms and changed into my swim shorts and shoved everything else into my backpack. There were no lockers so I brought the backpack with me. Everyone else hopped, skipped and jumped across the burning hot sand out to the water but I’d wisely kept my shoes on to this point. I left my socks, shoes and backpack at the water’s edge and headed into the murky Dead Sea.

Dead Sea Resort

Floating in the Dead Sea

Let me tell you, floating in water at the lowest point on earth is neat. It would’ve been better without the “holiday resort” feel to it but access to the Dead Sea is controlled (fenced off in most non-resort locations) and I had no real means of getting here without assistance anyway, so I owed Khaled a lot.

Floating in the Dead Sea

It’s hard to explain what the sensation of floating is like. It’s relaxing, definitely, because you’re not expending any energy to keep yourself like that. It’s like lying down on the comfiest couch in the world, one that changes shape to suit you. 

Floating in the Dead Sea is an experience you’ll have to enjoy for yourself to understand, but whatever you do, don’t get the water in your eyes. It happened to me twice, and goddamn does it sting. Imagine cutting yourself then pouring a spoonful of salt into the open wound, then imagine the wound was in your eye. All right, it’s not quite that bad, but I couldn’t open my eye for about 10 minutes after the incident without being in saline agony. It burns, man, it burns.

You can also scoop up the mud at the bottom of the Sea and rub it over yourself. I mean, you could do that with mud anywhere, but the specific mud from the Dead Sea has health benefits. I rubbed the thick, sludgy stuff over myself and ended up looking like Bigfoot’s anorexic cousin.

After staying in the water a good few hours, I headed up to the pool. The sun set behind me as I swam, which might have been the most beautiful sunset of my life.

Magical Sunset Behind the Resort After a Day Trip to the Dead Sea

The Day Trip to the Dead Sea Ends

Around 7pm it was time to go.

The kids fell asleep immediately looking entirely content with everything. They’d enjoyed a great afternoon away from homework and boredom around the house.

As I watched the Jordanian landscape change from rural desert back to urban sprawl, I remembered day trips out from when I was a kid: to a theme park, or to the beach, or caravanning in Wales watching the rain batter the windows as we played Uno or Monopoly. My brother and I always fell asleep in the back of the car on the ride home, tired and content.

I realized that, despite the language and the country and the climate and a thousand other things, this day trip to the Dead Sea was altogether very familiar. As we drove back into the busy, frustrating, alien city, I was reminded that the world isn’t as big as it feels.

For more on Israel and Jordan, check out couchsurfing with a Bedouin, cycling around the Sea of Galilee, and being all Indiana Jones at Petra.

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121 Comments

  1. What a fantastic adventure! One I’m sure you will keep close to heart in years to come. Floating in the Dead Sea will be something you can always close your eyes and see again.

    Reply

    1. That’s the best thing about travel – the ability to go back whenever I want through my mind. Can’t get that with reading about a place from a book!

      Reply

  7. Hey, I have shared that experience and this really brought it back, it was a lovely read. And talk about pain getting getting salt in your eyes – I managed to slip and cut my leg on the salt rock – that was SO painful! Great descriptions and photos, look forward to seeing more! L x

    Reply

  16. Though the floating sensation was cool, I have to say my most persistent memory of the Dead Sea is that the water just felt oddly slimy…

    I also happened to have a scrape on my hand that turned bright red after exposure to the water, and has since healed into a purplish/brownish scar. Interesting side effect to high salt quantities. 🙂

    Reply

    1. A lot of people hate it and spend about five minutes in the water just to say they’ve done it. Pretty awesome to be able to show someone and your scar and say “I got this at the Dead Sea.” That’s the joy of travel!

      Reply

  21. Sounds like quite the experience. It always feels a little skewed when you have to pay 16x what locals pay to visit the same place, for no apparent reason other than you are foreign. Great job on being freshly pressed!

    Reply

  26. Hilarious and well-written. Enjoyed it! Living in Dubai, I can totally envision him stopping the car in the middle of the road and thinking it’s normal/acceptable. Driving is definitely different in this part of the world! Congrats on being FP’d.

    Reply

  32. Firstly congrats on the FP 😀
    Great post and lovely pictures – it sounds like it was quite an adventure even down to trawling through the market and stepping on toes! Next destination? 😀

    Reply

    1. Currently working in England, but might squeeze in a mini-break to somewhere like Poland/Switzerland. Japan or India will be my next big trip methinks.

      Reply

  33. Despite the fact that I am very buoyant and can float in ANY water, this sounds really neat. I want to try it someday. Glad to know that it’s going to take some money and some effort to get there.

    Reply

  34. Great post. Brought back memories of 1979/80 when I did it. Got the usual image of a friend reading the London ‘Times’ while floating. The paper got wet and ruined and my ‘friend’ disappeared 30 years ago. . . but the memories live on.

    Reply

  35. You just took us on an adventure. The experience was potent enough to cause a slight shift in the way my reality looks — much like going to a distant land and returning home; your house, your dog, the contents of your pantry all seem to have taken on a novel and incandescent appearance. Your writing has done that.

    I also find it compelling that even in the most remote or foreign or unfamiliar of places, it only takes a specific matter of time before complacency sets in, the newness wears off, and our human-ness takes over and it suddenly makes no difference whether we are in Uzbekistan or our living room; people irritate and inconvenience us. We somehow find a way of losing sight of the wonder in all things, no matter how wonderful they are. Human nature, I suppose.

    Wonderful article.

    Reply

    1. Human nature indeed. I find it both fascinating and intriguing and is the reason I continue to travel, to find new places that excite me and where I don’t feel complacent (at least not immediately). Wonderful comment. 🙂

      Reply

  40. Totally off topic, but still:

    What’s up with all these readers plugging their blog on your article? For what it’s worth, I find that insanely rude and immensely indicative of a person’s serious disregard for quality writing. Personally, I would never visit anyone’s site who has commented with a hyperlink and nothing of substance pertaining to the post itself. There are ample ways to raise your stats without looking like a total dueche, and more probably actually being one.

    I hope I’m never freshly pressed. 🙂

    Reply

    1. Yup, they’re spam, and I should delete them.

      I’m more likely to click on someone (and go to their blog) if they’ve posted a funny/interesting/useful comment, not just a link. Good manners are attractive!

      Reply

  42. those pictures are something else. My girlfriend has been, I have not, she said it was kind of hard to float comfortably/read like everyone always talks about.

    Reply

    1. I didn’t actually try and read or do anything like that, but the water isn’t completely still – the second time I got salt in my eyes was caused by a surprise wave sneaking up on me. And if you just lie there, you end up drifting quite a lot.

      Reply

  43. Great post! I appreciate your humour. I expect that I will think the same murderous thoughts as I am faced by elbows in my upcoming trip to India.

    Reply

  44. I went on the Israeli side – so had a different experience getting onto the beach 🙂 (Though there’s no pool on the Israeli side – I would’ve appreciated a dip afterwards for sure!)

    I definitely loved the sea too though, my friends and I spent definitely spent a significant amount of time in the water! (Luckily a German girl had warned us not to shave for several days beforehand, so no cuts or nicks to get wickedly burned!)

    And congrats on the FP! 🙂

    Reply

      1. Um… I believe it’s Eilat (at the Red Sea and the border of Jordan). My friends and I took a bus from Jerusalem, stopped at the Dead Sea for the day, and then continued on the bus later than night to Eilat. But there’s constant buses from Eilat and Jerusalem to the Dead Sea. It was pretty easy to get there.

        Reply

      1. Time & money are the two biggest factors. The best thing I can do is book a trip once or twice a year far in advance, and hope for the best. Chicago in a month, Vegas in January!

        Reply

        1. Both great cities in VERY different ways! Definitely harder to travel from America because the place is so far from everywhere else. Europe is awesome!

          Reply

  51. I really enjoyed reading this post! It sounds like an awesome experience! I had the same caravan trips, but I’m Welsh so the rain didn’t keep us inside! haha

    Reply

  52. ‘The world isn’t as big as we think it is.’ – Perfect closing line to a wonderful post.

    Well done, very worthy of being Freshly Pressed (now that I know what it means!)

    x

    Reply

  57. Ultra new to WordPress, as in I just signed up tonight. Yours was the first blog I read and I loved it! Hooked. Think you just got yourself another fan. Great stuff!

    Reply

  58. i enjoyed reading this. i’m only curious with one thing: why did the hotel owner suddenly want to take you to a day trip to the dead sea? was it part of his hospitality to the guests?

    Reply

          1. congrats for being freshly pressed btw. quite all right for one time experience, i suppose. so you’re still in the middle east or already back to homeland?

  68. I chortled, you will be pleased to hear! You have a lovely way of writing Mr Wilberforce, and now that I no longer earn a City salary and will be doing my tourism vicariously, I will be a regular visitor to your blog. I have liked you on Facebook too, just to be sure I don’t miss any trips

    Reply

    1. YAY a new Facebooker! It’s kind of lonely over there at the moment. Most of my trips are in the past too actually, although I did just get back from Norway. There’ll be a post about a Norwegian Halloween party and porridge in the snowy woods coming along soon!

      Reply
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