Istanbul to Petra

Thank you, Templeton. We WANT to drive through the desert, that's why we are not doing the 55 minute flight which would get us closer to Petra. We haven't gotten to the point of checking for visas. As I mentioned above, we will do two nights, and that will have to suffice for now.

MVBergan: And if you know where we can rent the flying carpet, let me know. As I mentioned in my post, we are driving from the airport.

Hi, John. Thank you. We will check this possibility out. I did not come across it in my research. We do want to drive through the desert, but perhaps we will need to save time, and you have made an excellent suggestion. Thanks!

Hi,

The "problem" is not driving (it's easy to drive around and the roads are in good conditions) but the duration of your visit.

Petra in less than one day is a joke.

But up to you…

Michel

Hope I'm not to late to reply to this.

One way to save time is to fly into Jordan and out from Istanbul (or vice versa).
Check out the fares as not only would you save time, you'd probably also save money - through not needing to buy Istanbul-Amman round-trip tickets.
Also - I'm not sure about this, but I think the Jordanian airlines offer a free trip to Petra for passengers in transit to another destination.

#14 I think they do, or maybe a subsidised one- definately saw something when I was last in transit!

Thanks, Go 2.! We will call Jordanian Airlines tomorrow. We did look at the option of flying into one destination and out another because we're adding Petra at the end or at the start of the trip, whatever is cheaper. We have one in-country flight in Turkey, too. Because we're traveling in late May/early June, we want to go to Petra first. We figure two weeks will make a difference in desert temps. BTW, I'm going to post a question about biking in Turkey. If you've got any firsthand experience of that in Eastern Anatolia, would you reply? Thanks.

Thanks, Genya! We will call tomorrow, as I mentioned to Go 2. Please let me know if you have any experience biking in Eastern Anatolia. I'm going to put up a post soon about that.

Hi, All. In case you are still reading this thread, I can confirm that Royal Jordanian does indeed have a deal, although we may not take advantage of it: If you fly RJA to Amman RT to Amman, they give you a free RT to Istanbul (our destination after Petra). However, it's far more expensive than Turkish Airlines. The reason we may not be able to do is my husband had an accident several years ago, and his leg swells up on long airplane flights.

We are trying to figure out whether we can just do an airport layover on the way to Turkey and/or Jordan. Two hours would help, as then my husband can walk around. FYI, we've put three nights in for Petra so we can drive around to see where Lawrence of Arabia was filmed. Thank you for your advice. I'm sure I will be posting again.

Good to hear you're planning on spending more time in Petra. Though be warned - there's a lot of walking involved unless you avail yourselves of the (supposedly free) horse rides through the siq, etc.
Take it slowly and carefully, to enjoy it the most.

Have a great trip!