Jordan Highlights: Petra, Wadi Rum & the Dead Sea

Omar meets you at Queen Alia International Airport — around five hours' flight from the UK — and transfers you to your hotel in the leafy embassy district of Amman. The drive in introduces you to the white limestone city spread over its seven hills. The remainder of the day is yours to recover from the journey, with a relaxed welcome dinner of mezze — hummus, mutabal, vine leaves, freshly baked flatbread — at a favourite local restaurant.

A full-day excursion north to Jerash, one of the best-preserved Roman provincial cities in the world. You enter through Hadrian's Arch and walk the great Oval Plaza ringed by its colonnade, the cardo maximus still grooved by chariot wheels, the soaring Temple of Artemis and a Roman theatre with acoustics so perfect a coin dropped at the centre can be heard from the back row. Omar reads the city as a living place — where people shopped, worshipped and watched the games. Return to Amman in the late afternoon, with a short orientation drive past the Citadel and the Roman theatre in the city centre.

Heading south, you stop at Madaba to see the famous 6th-century mosaic map of the Holy Land laid into the floor of St George's Church — the oldest surviving cartographic depiction of the region. A short drive on, Mount Nebo offers the view that Moses is said to have had over the Jordan Valley, the Dead Sea and, on a clear day, the hills of Jerusalem. You then continue along the scenic King's Highway towards Petra, arriving at your hotel beside the entrance to the ancient site in the late afternoon — settled and ready for tomorrow.

A full day at Petra, beginning early before the heat and the crowds. You walk down through the Siq — a flat 1.2km path winding between sandstone cliffs 200 metres high — until the Treasury (Al-Khazneh) reveals itself in the famous sliver of view. Omar explains the genius of the Nabataeans, who controlled the incense and spice trade and channelled water across the desert to build a city of 30,000 in this hidden valley. You continue along the Street of Façades and the Colonnaded Street at your own pace. The optional climbs to the Monastery (Ad Deir, 800+ steps) and the High Place of Sacrifice are left entirely to you — and easily skipped without missing the heart of the site.

A gentle morning: either a return visit to Petra for those who want more time among the tombs, or a relaxed start by the pool. Around midday you drive south to Wadi Rum, the great desert valley of red sand and towering sandstone massifs where Lawrence of Arabia rode and where countless films have been shot. You transfer to an open 4x4 jeep for a sunset desert drive — past Lawrence's Spring, the red dunes and the natural rock arches — before arriving at your desert camp for a Bedouin feast cooked in a zarb (an underground sand oven) and a night beneath a sky thick with stars.

A final morning in the desert — perhaps a short jeep run to a viewpoint to watch the early light change the colour of the sands — before breakfast and the drive north along the Dead Sea Highway. The descent is remarkable: the road drops below sea level, signs marking the depth, until you reach the lowest point on the surface of the earth at around 430 metres below sea level. Check in to your spa resort on the shore in the early afternoon, with time for a first, gentle float before sunset over the hills of the West Bank.

A full day at leisure to enjoy the extraordinary buoyancy of the Dead Sea — so salt-dense (around ten times saltier than the ocean) that you cannot sink, floating effortlessly on your back to read a newspaper if you wish. The famous black mineral mud, scooped from the shore, is a natural skin treatment. The resort's spa, freshwater pools and shaded terraces invite a thoroughly indulgent day of doing very little. Omar is on hand for anyone who would like an optional half-day excursion to the Baptism Site (Bethany-beyond-the-Jordan) on the River Jordan.

A relaxed final breakfast and, depending on your flight time, perhaps a last float before Omar transfers you to Queen Alia International Airport — around an hour from the Dead Sea — for your flight home to the UK.