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Sunday 30th July 1995                                                                                                                                              

Jerash Festival, Amman, Jordan

The Cavern Beatles have played in Jordan twice, this was the first time.  The bands line up in 1995 was Derek, Rick, Phil and John.  Also along on this trip was our sound man, Nick Armitage.

The venue for our performance was the 2000 year old amphitheatre in Jerash, a small town just outside Amman.  To say that we were astounded when we arrived for the sound check is an understatement. Getting off the bus with our guitars and watching our back-line being loaded off the back of an open truck was quite surreal.  We had never done anything like this before.

All these pictures are enlargeable in a new window.

Our performance at the Jerash Festival was filmed for TV broadcast in front of 1200 people including Queen Noor.
Although I still have a copy of this show on videotape, most of the whole trip to Jordan has now become a little misty and I wish I had made notes.  At least these pictures serve as a reminder for us.

One of the biggest regrets of my life was not taking up the offer to go to Petra for the day.  It was going to be an 8 hour round-trip journey in a ricketty old bus with no air conditioning and as the temperature was pushing 100 degrees, we opted out.  
Instead, John, Nick and I, took the same bus to the Dead Sea.  This was only an hours drive from Amman, so we thought we could handle that.  What an incredible experience!  Everyone knows that you just float in this body of water because it is so dense with salt, but to actually do it is incredible.  The only trouble with it is that if there is even the tiniest cut on your body, you feel it stinging like you wouldn't believe.
After messing about in the water for an hour or so, we were taken to a lagoon a few miles away, which seemed to be used like some sort of swimming pool by the locals.  It was a little un-nerving that we had an armed guard with us, and there didn't seem like we were in an danger, but I guess they must have had their reasons.