Looking for some place to take the kids on a weekend afternoon?  Hoping for some place that won’t drain your wallet?  Want to get out of Amman for a few hours?  Well, take a gander at the Mountain Breeze Country Club.

It’s about an hour away, off the Amman-Jerash highway.  If you were really adventurous (and didn’t require nap-breaks) then you could tag it on the end of a day of exploration at Jerash.  Let the kids get some more energy out, and have a meal over-looking a breathtaking vista.

The Club costs nothing to enter, but they don’t allow food and drinks inside and hope that you’ll take advantage of their restaurant and snack bar.  The do offer camping, paintball and archery, for a fee (as well as “team-building exercises” if you feel it’s warranted).  But they also have a shaded playground available for free for the little ones.

The grounds are beautifully landscaped and afford some shade along the paths, which are slated-wood and therefore fairly stroller-friendly if you need that.  The restaurant offers basic family-friendly selections, but the view is outstanding and worth it.

All in all, it’s a nice get-away for a few hours and gets you out of the mall or the movies and literally into the mountain breeze for a day.

They do have a fairly good map and directions on their website.  One thing to note, if you’re relying on your GPS instead of the directions… don’t.  Use both.  You can either take the exit for Ayn al-Basha, then follow it parallel to the road in the same direction until you see the enormous satellite dishes on the left, and come to a traffic circle, then follow the website’s directions.  Or, you can go to the next exit (as the website suggests), passing the satellite dishes on the left in Baqa’a, and make the subsequent u-turn and return to the same traffic circle and follow their directions from there.

After you turn off by the satellites (regardless of which exit you take), just keep an eye out for the Mountain Breeze signs leading you up and around, kilometer by kilometer.  For whatever reason, our Garmin kept insisting we take the smaller “roads” (or goat paths) and we eventually just ignored it and followed the signs, which lead us straight there.

Check out their website for directions and further details:  http://www.jordanadventure.com/