Day 14:69 - Jerash, Save the Best for Last

It is now 69 days into a 70-day adventure. Honestly, we are ready to go home. There was one more Viking excursion to do. We almost blew it off! We are so glad we didn’t. Jerash is an unknown gem to the average person — like us — but truly a gem.

By the time we arrived, I realized Jerash is not just “some ruins in Jordan.” It is one of the best-preserved Greco-Roman cities anywhere in the world — once known as Gerasa — and part of the Decapolis, a league of ten Roman cities that flourished nearly 2,000 years ago. Walking through Hadrian’s Arch, standing in the Oval Plaza surrounded by columns, and imagining chariots racing through the hippodrome… this was not rubble. This was an intact story. Empires rose here. Trade moved through here. Christianity spread through here. Earthquakes damaged it, time buried it, and somehow the desert protected it. Jerash isn’t just old — it is layered history you can physically step into.

Honestly, we were exhausted and wanted to be on the plane heading home.

Once we got to Jerash — we didn’t want to leave. The place is HUGE. The archaeological site stretches across roughly 800,000 square meters (nearly 200 acres), making it one of the largest and best-preserved Roman provincial cities in the world outside of Italy. More than 90% of the ancient city still lies buried beneath the surrounding hills, which means what you see today is only a fraction of what once stood here. And what you do see? Colonnaded streets that still run for half a mile, soaring temples, theaters that still host performances, and stonework that has somehow held its lines for nearly two millennia. There was no way to cover it all in the short time we had. Our Viking tour guide did a great job showing us the highlights and explaining the layers of history.

Through a photography and artist lens, images jump out at you. Light sliding across fluted columns. Repeating arches creating rhythm and pattern. Long shadows stretching down ancient streets. This is a place to explore several days in a row, at different times, with different lighting. I would have loved to watch the sunrise and the sunset here every day for a week.

Hopefully, the photos on this post do it justice. Enjoy!

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