Steemians!!! Let me tell you a tale about our escape from a Crusaders castle in Jordan.
Early this year my girlfriend and I spent a week adventuring through Jordan.
We spent 2 days exploring the city of Petra, then we were lucky enough to stop at the Crusaders Castle of Shobak on our way to Wadi Rum.
This castle sits on top of a hill in a very remote location mainly desert, rolling hills with some caves here and there and you might see a Bedouin shepherd ( the Bedouin is a grouping of nomadic Arab peoples who live in the desert ) with his sheep and goats walking through the hills.
To the left is the entrance to the church underground
As we walked up the hill to the ruins of the once mighty Shobak castle, we could see the original silk road in the distance. We entered the castle and there was still some stone structures standing from all those years ago. We explored around the castle as our tour guide told us stories from days gone by.
He told us that the last stand of the crusaders in this castle was an 18 month siege.
That is crazy to think that a army was attacking for 18 months straight and these guys held shit down by shooting arrows, throwing boulders down the mountain and pouring vats of boiling oil on the attackers. imagine coping boiling oil all over you....... that's a brutal way to go.
Defence tower Arrowslit
Now like every good castle design back in the day, you needed that plan B escape tunnel, and Shobak was no different.
entrance to the escape tunnel
This tunnel runs straight to the bottom of mountain that the castle sits on. It is 375 steps doug out of the ground straight down. Now if you are claustrophobic, no good with heights or scared of the dark, I would not recommend exiting out of the castle this way, just walk back down the hill. But if your up for abit of an adventure this is for you :)
The descent begins
There is no light in the tunnel so make sure you have a torch on your phone to light up your way down, and tread carefully as the steps are all uneven and it gets a bit slippery from sand at some parts.
Looking back up to the entrance of the tunnel
Now I'm not the best with heights and get a bit dizzy so I found myself shimmying down the steep stairs on my butt haha but it did help with the dizziness at the very steep parts.
Escape tunnel squad
The whole descent takes about 20 minutes till you get to the bottom where a steel ladder leads up to the exit on the side of the mountain.
Exit of the tunnel
This was something i had no idea about until we stopped here on our way to Wadi Rum. I am so grateful I got to experience this castle and adventure down the escape tunnel. It was a highlight of Jordan thats for sure :)
So if you are ever roaming the deserts of Jordan and you find yourself in Shobak make sure you check out this dope castle you will not be disappointed.
Thanks for reading, and if you liked it please give it a upvote or restream and don't forget to give me a follow for more super mega turbo rad adventure tales :)
PEACE
