Heads up: some links here are affiliate links. Book or buy through them and we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only point you to things we would actually use. It would be easy to assume a village of roughly 6,000 people with no craft district has nothing hands-on to offer. That assumption is wrong here: Umm Qais earned a UNWTO Best Tourism Village recognition in December 2022 specifically for a community tourism model built around exactly these workshops, run out of homes rather than storefronts.

Heads up: some links here are affiliate links. Book or buy through them and we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only point you to things we would actually use. There is no five-star spa resort in Umm Qais, no infinity pool, no turndown chocolate. What it has instead is a 2,000-year-old colonnaded street that goes gold in the last hour of daylight, which for the right couple beats the resort every time.

Heads up: some links here are affiliate links. Book or buy through them and we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only point you to things we would actually use. Split a 20 JOD Makmoura lunch across a group and the number looks like pocket change. It is not: the Jordanian Dinar is pegged at 1 JOD to roughly 1.41 USD, so a 20 JOD bill for the table is closer to 28 US dollars, not 20.

Heads up: some links here are affiliate links. Book or buy through them and we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only point you to things we would actually use. Umm Qais has no petting zoo, no playground, and no themed kids’ trail through the ruins. If a family itinerary is built around finding one, it needs rebuilding, because the site works for children in a completely different way.