Day 13 Finally, We Got Some Sleep

It’s just after 7:00 AM in Wadi Musa, Petra. I’m sitting in the restaurant of the Mövenpick Hotel, which is located exactly across from the entrance to Petra.

But don’t let that fool you into thinking Petra is simply a quick stroll out the front door. That assumption will be corrected… later… in another post.

Right now, this moment feels rare on this trip.

Donna and I are independently doing our two favorite things. I’m at a table with a cup of coffee, a mushroom and Swiss cheese omelet, and my cell phone with the iclever. Bluetooth keyboard (which I totally love. It frees me from needing a laptop when I travel).—finally updating the FindPenguins blog (which I am very behind on). Donna, meanwhile, is undisturbed in Room 127, asleep in a way that suggests she has no intention of waking up anytime soon.

We are both in our happy places.

We left East Windsor, Connecticut on November 6, 2025. That makes today Day 67 of traveling, with three days still to go. During the first leg of the trip, I did a respectable job keeping up with the blogging. Since then, however, the pace has felt faster than the Indianapolis 500—minus the safety barriers, plus a few unscheduled pit stops and at least one minor crash-and-burn.

Yesterday, we actually got to walk into and experience Petra. It was another early morning, another long bus ride, and another very long walk that politely pretended to be shorter than it actually was. By the time dinner rolled around, life became wonderfully simple: dump clothes on the floor, take a shower, and be in bed before 9:00 PM like two people who now fully understand the appeal of senior discounts.

But last night was special.

Why, you ask?

Three reasons:
1. We were so tired that falling asleep required absolutely no effort—no counting sheep, no staring at the ceiling, no life reflections.
2. No alarms. No wake-up calls. We could get out of bed whenever our bodies decided it was time—which is the gold standard of luxury travel.
3. We’re staying a second night in this hotel. No packing. No luggage in the hallway. No “meet in the lobby at an ungodly hour.”

In other words: bliss.

Donna is sleeping in. I’m up early, well-rested, caffeinated, and feeling suspiciously normal. Honestly, this is the closest we’ve come to our regular, at-home life in quite a while.

I also know Donna is still recovering from being sick last week, and we have a long 20+ hour flight coming up on Thursday. That flight may very well be the final nail in her coffin—she does not do long-haul flights well, and she would be the first to confirm that.

As for the rest of today? That’s still undecided. Our Viking tour guide will determine the afternoon plans, and it’s entirely weather-dependent. Yesterday was beautiful. This morning? VERY breezy. VERY cold. The kind of cold that makes you rethink how much you actually love being outside.

So the afternoon excursion is officially TBD.

I also can’t remember if we signed up for dinner in a Jordanian home tonight. I hope we did—it would be a lovely way to complete this Petra experience. If not, it’ll be dinner in the hotel and then back to Amman in the morning.

Either way, we’ll survive.

Thank you for allowing me this non-exciting, trying-to-catch-up FindPenguins post. I mostly just needed to get my fingers moving on the keyboard again—and to say thank you to everyone who continues to support Donna and me as we travel and learn to see the world… and ourselves.

⸻

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