Private Tour to Madaba, Mount Nebo, Bethani

The tour starts at 09:00, your driver meets you in the lobby of your hotel.

After we pick you up from your hotel we drive towards Madaba, “The City of Mosaics”. In many respects Madaba is a typical East Bank town which differs in one major aspect: underneath almost every house lies a fine Byzantine mosaic. Many of these mosaics have been excavated and are on display in the town’s museum, but it is estimated that many more lie hidden waiting to be discovered.

Madaba’s chief attraction – in the contemporary Greek Orthodox church of St. George – is a wonderfully vivid, 6th-century Byzantine mosaic map showing the entire region from Jordan and Palestine in the north, to Egypt in the south.

This map includes a fascinating plan of Jerusalem: on the left is the north gate from which two colonnaded streets run south. On the straight street through the heart of the city stands the domed Holy Sepulcher. Clearly inscribed above the north and east gates is the legend “Holy City of Jerusalem”.

After visiting Madaba the tour will continue to Mount Nebo.
Mount Nebo’s highest crest reaches an altitude of 800 meters above the surrounding Belqa plateau. The other peaks are slightly lower, all of them rising from 700 meters. Of these, the two most important, historically speaking are the peaks of Siyagha (710m.) on the western side and the peak of el Mukhayyat (790m.) on the S-E. All the year-round several streams flow down the sides of the mountain: Ayoun Mousa and Ain Jemmaleh on the north, Ain Judeideh, Kanisah and Ain Hery on the south.
You will visit an old monastery; overlook the Jordan Valley, the Dead Sea and parts of the Holy Land.

Bethany is one of the 3 most important places of pilgrimage in Christianity.
Less than 2 km east of the Jordan River is an important place associated with the lives of Jesus and John The Baptist, the settlement of Bethany, where John lived and baptized. John 1:28 refer to it as “Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing”. In John 10:40 it is mentioned as the place to which Jesus fled for safety after being threatened with stoning in Jerusalem: “Then Jesus went back across the Jordan to the place where John had been baptizing in the early days”.

This settlement beyond the Bethany has recently been identified on the south bank of the small perennials stream named Wadi Kharrar, just east of the Jordan River and opposite Jericho. It is being excavated, protected, and made accessible for visitors.

The small natural hill forming the core of Bethany is called Elijah’s Hill, or Tell Mar Elias in Arabic. Local tradition for thousands of years has identified it as the place from where Elijah ascended to heaven.

Bethany’s ancient remains include structures from the 1st-century settlement of John the Baptist (pbuh), including large plastered pools with steps for full immersion, and the 5th-6th century remains of the Byzantine period settlement called Ainon or Saphsaphas and depicted on the 6th century Madaba Mosaic Map of the Holy Land.

After visiting Bethany we come back to your hotel.