Travel diaries: From Jordan to Egypt

Amman was a great place to start our small group tour. We explored the markets in downtown Amman, where the smells of falafel and baklawa lingered in the air, and we tried dates, nuts and olives. Amman's markets are slightly more laidback than the likes of Morocco's souks, and it was a real cultural immersion.

They process everything at the point of sale, so if you order a coffee, they're roasting the coffee beans; and if you buy sugar cane juice, they're extruding it straight from the sugar cane into the jar. Our tour leader told us what everything was and how to order, which was really helpful to learn.

In Amman we enjoyed tasty street food, including knafeh, which is a sweet cheese-filled filo pastry.

Petra simply blew me away. Our hotel was less than a five-minute walk from the entrance, so we went early to avoid the heat of the day. We arrived first at the Treasury, an incredible structure carved out of the rock, before hiking to the Monastery. The route gets steep quickly, but there are plenty of little cafes along the way for you to stop off at.

Finally, you're rewarded with the Monastery; it's another striking structure, but wasn't as busy as the Treasury. It took about an hour and a half to reach the Monastery from the Treasury. In fact, Petra is a huge site that you could spend a couple of days at, but one day is plenty to pack in the highlights.

That night, we returned to Petra to see the ancient facade of the Treasury illuminated by different colored light projections. We sat down on carpets and listened to people playing local instruments. I'll always remember that moment!

A real appeal of Wadi Rum is that it's a popular filming location, including Dune, Lawrence of Arabia and Star Wars. We joined a jeep tour that passed lots of amazing scenery like sand dunes. The open-top vehicle takes you to a nice sunset spot, before we enjoyed an overnight stay in a Bedouin-style camp - it was a real pinch-me moment!

Beneath the inky black sky, our guide shared stories about Bedouin culture with us. Being in the desert at night amid the open air was a great cultural experience; it was so dark and quiet, which isn't something you experience often.

We visited the Blue Hole, a underwater sinkhole on the Red Sea coast. Masks and fins were provided, so we went snorkelling. The waters were great quality and we saw loads of colorful fish, turtles and reefs.

One (very early) morning, I woke up at 2am and joined a guided hike up Mount Sinai. The walk was tiring, but not difficult - the hardest part was getting up so early! We talked about Bedouin culture and what we'd been up to on the rest of our trip.

We reached the top around 4.15am and settled down with a blanket and soft mat to wait for the sunrise. Then, the light slowly poured over the landscape ahead of us; it was beautiful, and easily the best sunrise I'd ever seen.