Such was the concensus in the vehicle I took from Amman to Baghdad, a twelve hour journey that had us eating a plenty at dusk and snoozing a lot as well. This being Ramadan, the race is on from sunset to sunrise to get your food in for the day as the fast must last from sunrise to sunset. Iraq is far more flat than I had anticipated, and this place gets quite cold at night. In our large GMC Suburban we plied the wide motorways from the Jordanian border to Baghdad, the sun slowly rising, the smell of gasoline always omniscient.
Most of them were concerned for my overall security. I made it in cheaply, at only 40USD, but paid the driver another 10 to take me to a decent hotel - at 15USD per night, less than I had anticipated. The city is crowded and busy, but war damage is still quite easy to spot - the old communications tower, The Jordanian embassy, a massive building that I was told was a market, and just across the street from my hotel are a few more demolished buildings. Coalition soldiers are easy to spot, though there are fewer of them than I had expected; I suppose all of the journalists hang around them and only take pictures of them, to make things appear different than they really are.
Doing this overnight was a pretty handy way of doing it, since the scenery is pretty boring before Ramadi and I'm ahead of schedule now. The only hitch we had was near Fallujah when a US tank broke down the highway barrier and parked itself right in the middle of the road, barrel pointed at us. A soldier on top was simply pointing in the opposite direction. The driver looked incredulous at him for a second, since of course he was demanding we turn around on a freeway, and when it was obvious he wasn't moving, we turned around, dodged oncoming traffic, and drove through Fallujah. Nice mosque in that town.
I was set up at a hotel near the Palestine, a decent place and a good price. Even though I managed some rest on the ride in, a nap was still the first order of the day - a GMC sleep isn't the most comfortable available.
Baghdad
