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The beautiful palace of Beit ed-Dine is justly a favourite place to visit. Set high in the Chouffe, the palace was built for a powerful local Muslim, Bashir Shihab, and took some 30 years to complete. The palace was hardly finished before he was sent in to exile by the Ottoman rulers of Lebanon who feared his influence. After many years as a government building it was declared a national monument and now the President of Lebanon has use of apartments in the palace as his summer residence.
The palace contains several museums. The one in the entrance hall is dedicated to Kamal Jumblatt (father of the current Druze leader, Walid Jumblatt) who was assassinated in 1977. Upstairs, several rooms form the Archaeological and Ethnographic Museum displaying everything from Canaanite pottery to Islamic weaponery and beautifully embroidered local costumes.
The huge stables and barracks area at the rear of the palace house the impressive mosaic museum.
. Leave a Comment Directions: Beit ed-Dine is approx 50km from Beirut. Bus no 31 from the Cola bus station will take you there, but be careful to check the time of the last bus.Website: http://www.beiteddine.org/history.html
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The Cedars of Lebanon are fabled. Ever since Gilgamesh used them to build his city, the wood has been prized for grand buildings and exploited as fuel, with the result that only a small stand of truly ancient trees remains. These venerable giants may be rather ragged and worn now but they are cherished and protected as national treasures.
A reaforestation project has planted many new stands in the mountains -the trees only grow well at high altitudes - but they are very slow growing so it will be a long time before the slopes begin to look wooded once more.
The walk through the trees is very peaceful and pleasant, if you avoid weekends. If you drive yourself you can come in at the bottom of the grove and walk up to the main entrance - that way you come to the trees quietly, a much nicer approach than running the gauntlet of souvenir shops that line the road down to the entrance from the main carpark. Whichever way you approach, there is a small fee to pay. Leave a Comment
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Roman Heliopolis, the city dedicated to the sun, Baalbek is grandeur incarnate. The scale of the ruins here is absolutely awesome.
Try to spend a night here - to see the ruins in the golden light of sunset and the pale, pearly light of early morning and the effect of the changing light on the backdrop of snow-topped Mt Lebanon. If you can, stay at the Palmyra Hotel - possibly the most atmospheric hotel in all the Levant, with its air of faded past glories and ancient staff. Take a walk through the town - you're in Hzbollah country here, conservative Shi'ite values prevail, so dress modestly and save your shorts for Beirut.
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Zahle is a pleasant place to stop for a while if you're heading for Baalbek in the North Bekaa after crossing in to Lebanon from Syria. With lots of restaurants serving both Lebanese food and a variety of more Western-style snacks, local wine or big glasses of fresh juice ( we ate at Adonis , on Rue de Brazil - excellent roast chicken sandwiches and fresh citrus juice) an hour or two spent here over a meal and a walk through the streets with their mix of new and old houses and several churches, shows you the laid-back and relaxed face of Lebanon's 3rd biggest city. Leave a Comment
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Giving its name to both the Bible and words we connect with books, Byblos has a history dating back many thousands of years. The first cursive alphabet came from here, leading to writing and recording on papyrus rather than clay tablets. Cedar for Egypt and copper from Jordan passed through the city. The Phoenicians made it one of their trading ports. Romans and Crusaders followed and left their mark. The layers of history are piled one on top of the other, and excavation has occasionally led to monuments being moved so the ones below can be excavated in their turn.
All of this has led to the archaeological site at Byblos looking rather like a history sampler - a little bit of Phoenician, a Roman ruin or three, Hittite here, Calcolithic there, a Byzantine oil press next to a Persian fortress, all overlooked by the Crusader caste. It's very picturesque. Leave a Comment Directions: The archaeological park is situated south of the mediaeval city. You enter through the castle.
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The Cedars
This resort in the north of the country is named after the most famous of Lebanon's ancient cedar forests. The Cedars Resort is one of the best equipped ski resorts and has been in use and expanding rapidly since the first ski lift was installed by the government in 1953.
Altitude 2300 to 3000 meters
Good variety of slopes for all levels, from beginners to very experienced.
Longer season than other resorts: from November to the end of April.
Opening hours: 8.00 to 15.30 hrs. (weekend to 16.00 hrs.)
Lift lengths varying from 800 to 1200 meters
Average gradients: from 10 to 40% (max. 61%)
Also: cross-country ski, snowboarding, snowmobile, snowshoeing, paragliding.
Experienced instructors, medical staff and safety personnel on site
Snow grooming equipment for slopes maintenance
Snow ploughs to secure road safety.
As expected, après ski is excellent, with numerous restaurants, pubs and night clubs! The Cedars area is of outstanding natural beauty. On clear days the views of the Mediterranean coast are spectacular. In addition to the Cedars Forest there are numerous sites of interest nearby, such as the village of Bcharré, birth- and resting place of Gibran Khalil Gibran, Lebanon's most famous poet, artist and novelist. The Gibran Museum houses his paintings, drawings and personal effects. Don't miss the beautiful Qadisha Valley, with its picturesque villages, chapels and monasteries. Leave a Comment
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The pretty stone-built village of Deir el Qamar has been preserved as a national monument since the 1950s but this is no sterile museum piece. Any new building is subject to very strict controls but this is a village where people live and work.
The village was an important centre for the silk trade. The old silk khan may no longer deal in the precious fabric, but the late 16th century building is put to good use as the French Cultural Institute. Visitors are welcome to look through the building to see both the architecture and the work of the Institute.
Across the road an old "serail" is now the town hall - again open to visitors. There is some good stonework in the central courtyard and a lovely domed and panelled room in what was once the royal apartments.
The small souq has a few shops still and there are several other lovely buildings. Leave a Comment Directions: Buses for Deir el -Qamar leave from Beirut's Cola bus station. Route 31. No service on Sundays or holidays.Website: http://www.deirelqamar.com
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Two Druze leaders, both named Fakir ud-Din, have left their mark on Deir el-Qamar. The first Fakir built the village's mosque in 1493, but it was the later Fakir ud-Din Maar who made the village his main seat and who exerted such influence in the region that his Ottoman overlords banished, and finally executed, him in 1635, who left his mark on Lebanon itself. Virtually all Lebanon was united under his rule and through his vision and influence the first modern-era trade connections were established with Europe. He is regarded by many as the man who conceived the idea of the modern state of Lebanon.
His palace is next to the silk souq and now houses a museum. Leave a Comment Directions: Service taxis and buses en route to Beit ed-Dine will stop in Deir el-Qamar. There are no buses on Sunday or on public holidays.Website: http://www.deirelqamar.com
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Tripoli is perhaps the most Arab of all Lebanon's cities. Certainly the souqs and the mediaeval city feels far less European than Beirut or Byblos. Whilst only small, the old city is packed with interesting and lovely buildings and it's all to easy to get quite lost in the maze of winding alleys and narrow streets. Much of it is very dilapidated but there is a lot of restoration going on and it is to be hoped that this will be sensitively done to retain the authenticity of the place and not turn it in to another somewhat-sanitised Byblos.
The city is full of mosques, madrassas and khans, many of them dating back to the 13th and 14th centuries, with odd bits of the Roman and Crusader past appearing here and there.
This is a much more conservative city than Beirut, so modest dress is fitting. Leave a Comment
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Byblos is actually known as Jbail these days, and the charming mediaeval heart of the city is only a small part of this busy, bustling town north of Beirut. Most of the town consists of the ubiquitous high-rise buildings that crowd the coastline with one town running into the next so that it all seems one big conurbation. There really isn't anything in the newer parts of town to attract the visitor apart from the beaches north and south of the archaeological site and some reasonable places to eat - places here are certainly cheaper than those down by the fishing harbour. Leave a Comment Directions: If you are coming to Byblos by bus, watch out for the stops because it is difficult to tell where one town ends and another begins along this road.
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on May 13, 2005
on April 15, 2005
