Petra

Petra lies concerning 3-5 hours south of modern Amman, about 2 hours north of Aqaba, on the boundaries of the mountainous desert of the Wadi Araba. The city is bordered by towering hills of rust-coloured sandstone which gave the city some natural defense next to invaders.

The site is semi-arid, the friable sandstone which allowable the Nabataeans to carve their temples and tombs into the rock breakdown easily to sand.The colour of the rock ranges from pale yellow or white during rich reds to the darker brown of more resistant rocks. The twisted strata of different-coloured rock form whorls and waves of colour in the rock face, which the Nabataeans browbeaten in their architecture.