Mary Jo Cooper photographed this minaret out of her hotel window in Amman. Linda says she married me because I liked to travel. I married her because she agreed to travel to places I chose. In our early days together we camped across the American West, backpacked across Eastern Europe, rode smoky buses and smokier motorcycles through Turkey, canoed with Indians to Angel Falls, cruised the Black Sea in a decrepid Russian ship, and took the TransSiberian Railway from Moscow to Vladivostok. It wasn't long before she was bathing au naturel in South American rivers and dining on exotic cuisine in African villages. All in the quest of adventure travel. What a trooper!

This Middle Eastern expedition was our most recent trip abroad. We chose to go with Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT), a subsidiary of Grand Circle Travel. We had been with them before to Thailand and enjoy their small groups and fast pace to hard- to- reach places. They call it "Adventure, Value & Discovery on the Road Less Traveled."

In March 2009 we flew to Cairo and met our Group of 23, all hardcore travelers and not one whiney- hiney even though several had to have assistance walking and climbing. We explored:

In Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan we were guarded closely by Tourist Police. • The history- rich Egyptian cities of Cairo and Luxor, including many famous pyramids and tombs

• The Suez Canal aboard a 50- passenger cruise ship

• Two cities in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

• The journey of Moses from the Nile bullrushes to Mt. Sinai, the Lost City of Petra, and Mt. Nebo.

• The water and mud of the Dead Sea

• Six UNESCO World Heritage Sites: Thebes, Cairo, Memphis, St. Catherine (Mt. Sinai), Petra, and Wadi Rum

• The modern city of Amman, Jordan.

As is the OAT tradition we enjoyed dinner with Bedouin tribes and Egyptian and Jordanian families and visited schools in Egypt and Jordan.

The age- old conflicts among Christians, Jews, and Muslims came alive on the trip as did the autocratic regimes of Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Our guides spoke out on these issues and answered our questions without hesitation.

A traditional couple walks by our bus in Saudi Arabia. All in all, our Middle Eastern Expedition was a wonderful experience, one we would highly recommend to anyone. The world is out there waiting, go explore it! You'll be a better person when you return.

Above, this small oasis was in the desert near Aqaba. At left, Linda was pleased with the attention given her by these Bedouin girls at Petra. These Jordanian girls in Aqaba were just plain happy. Warner finds a liquor store in Amman that will sell him wine for the last night of the trip. Our OAT ship docked next to this ship owned by the King of Jordan. Mary Jo Cooper caught the feeling of Saudi Arabia in this photo of a Bedouin girl. The Egyptian boys were happy to have Americans visit their school in Luxor.