Harrison Jacobs/Business Insider
Wadi Rum, a desert valley in Jordan, has played the part of Mars and distant planets in countless movies.
- Wadi Rum, a desert valley in Jordan, has played the part of Mars and distant planets in countless movies, including The Martian, Star Wars: Rogue One, Prometheus, and Red Planet, among others.
- The reddish hue of the sand combined with the massive granite rock faces and sandstone mesas makes for an otherworldly landscape.
- I recently visited. It was absolutely breathtaking. I'm already planning a return trip so I can spend more time in Wadi Rum.
Don't tell Elon Musk, but you don't have to fire off into space to visit Mars. Just get on a plane -or a bus - to the Middle Eastern Kingdom of Jordan.
Jordan is a small, dry, landlocked country that neighbors Israel on its eastern border. Within its rugged terrain is Wadi Rum, a desert valley famed for its dramatic sandstone and granite rock faces and the reddish hue of its sand.
The landscape is so otherworldly that countless filmmakers have used the desert as a location for films taking place on distant planets.
Most recently, the desert served as the backdrop for Mars in the Matt Damon-starring space-survival film The Martian.
But The Martian is far from the only film to use the desert. Wadi Rum has played the part of Mars in the 2000 film Red Planet and the 2013 film The Last Days on Mars. It played the part of the alien world in the 2012 alien-horror film Prometheus and the planet of Jeddah in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
On a recent trip to Jordan, I decided to take a road trip through Wadi Rum. After barreling through the desert in jeeps, sprinting down sand dunes, and riding on ATVs, I think I can say I've officially visited another planet.
Here's what it was like: