Crossing to Jordan and Flight to Egypt

In order to move on to our next and last country, (Egypt), we had booked a flight from Amman instead of Tel Aviv to avoid the very expensive cost and hassle of tight security from the Tel Aviv airport. However, getting back to Amman was not an easy task either. The easiest way to cross back over to Jordan from Jerusalem is via the Allenby/King Hussein Bridge, yet this is always the busiest border crossing and most crowded. The process is not very clear online, but with the help of my friend John in Ramallah we were prepared for all of it. This is our story of how we crossed:

In the morning we got in a shared taxi that took us to the Israeli border for only 35 shekels (about $8). We had a pretty easy ride through the desert except that at the end where we had a strange experience: we got stopped at a security checkpoint and had to wait quite a while. After about 3o minutes the driver asked Marissa and I to get out of the car and go talk to the Israeli security guards to tell them that we had a flight to catch (so we could pass by faster). This only happened because we were obviously American tourists and they apparently would listen to us more than anyone. We were pretty hesitant to do this as no one from the other 10 buses was outside and it seemed a bit dangerous to get out! We finally did, but our American pleas didn't really get us anywhere (just as we thought!)

Next we arrived at the Israeli exit where we had to pay the hefty exit tax of 167.50 shekels and pass through passport control. (We got our passports stamped on a separate piece of paper in the beginning, which unfortunately they take away when you leave. It would have been a great souvenir.) Next we got on another bus to take us to Jordan for 5 JDs (about $8 again). Before crossing they took our passport, which had to have a Jordanian visa obtained beforehand, and later they stamped and returned them to us. Finally we had to take a taxi, which we thankfully shared, to the airport for our final stop. Our flight wasn't until 8:30pm so we had a few hours to wait, and we spent them sleeping and eating in a real restaurant! Overall it was a long day totaling about 5 hours to get from Jerusalem to Amman airport, but it was an interesting experience and hopefully cheaper overall than flying from Tel Aviv to Cairo.

We took a short flight and by 10pm were in Egypt where an old friend was graciously waiting to take us on our Cairo adventure.