Dana Biosphere Reserve
Before the history — the practicalities
Getting in
- Surface
- Village lanes are rough cobble and bedrock; the canyon trail is loose stone and boulder from the first kilometre
- Gradient
- Village on a steep rim; the main trail descends 1,400 m over 14 km with no vehicle escape points
- Transfer points
- Feynan Ecolodge, at the canyon's bottom, is reachable by 4×4 from the Araba road side without any hiking
- Seating
- Guesthouse terraces on the rim; stone walls in the village; none on trails
- Shade
- Good in the village and at Feynan; the canyon trail is exposed for its middle hours
- Toilets
- Guesthouses and the RSCN centre; Feynan Ecolodge has one adapted room and bathroom
- Guides & orientation
- RSCN guides lead a short, mostly-level rim walk on request; Feynan runs vehicle-based sunset and coppermine visits
- Booking lead time
- Feynan adapted room and 4×4 back-road transfer — book a week ahead through the ecolodge directly
Why 2/5: 2/5, and it is the honest number: Dana is mountain terrain and the reserve's core experience — the canyon descent — has no accessible version. What earns the 2 rather than a 1: the rim terraces and their full canyon view are reachable by car, and Feynan Ecolodge at the canyon floor, with its adapted room, can be reached entirely by 4×4 from the desert side. Come for the view and the lodge, not the trail.
The place
What you are walking into
Dana is a cross-section through the Middle East's ecology, cut by one canyon. From the village on the rim at 1,500 metres, Wadi Dana drops to 100 metres below sea level at Feynan, and the fall runs through four biogeographic zones — Mediterranean, Irano-Turanian, Saharo-Arabian and Sudanian. Juniper and oak at the top; acacia and sand at the bottom; 700 plant species and 200 bird species in between, including the Syrian serin, which breeds almost nowhere else.
The village itself is Ottoman-era stone, part-abandoned in the 1970s when its families moved uphill for water and schools, then part-revived when the Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature made it the gateway to the reserve. Guesthouses now occupy the restored houses; the terraces below still grow the village's olives, figs and pomegranates on Nabataean-era walls.
The signature walk is downhill the whole way: 14 kilometres through Wadi Dana from village to Feynan, losing 1,400 metres, with the vegetation changing around you like slides. At the bottom, Feynan Ecolodge — solar-powered, candle-lit at night — sits beside copper mines that were worked from the Chalcolithic to the Byzantine, among the oldest industrial sites anywhere.
Even without walking anywhere, the rim delivers. The terrace views down the canyon at sunset, with griffon vultures riding the updraft at eye level, are the reason photographers stay three nights.
Close your eyes
Audio portrait
Wind coming up the canyon carries goat bells from terraces far below. Vultures pass close enough to hear the air in their feathers. In the village, doves in the ruins and a kettle on a wood stove.
Practical
Hours, passes, timing
- Opening hours
- Reserve open year-round; trail access controlled by RSCN — register before walking
- Jordan Pass
- Not covered — entry or day passes paid separately
- Best time
- March–May for flowers and raptor migration; October for clear air