Syria, Tadmur (Palmira)

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We got on the road early decided to try and see some ruins near the north Lebanon border before driving out to Palmira where we would stay for the night. Roads are poorly marked here and even though we now have a map in aerobic it is still very hard to navigate. We ask for directions frequently and many times since there are such a language barrier people are nice enough to jump in their car, bike or motorcycle and tell us to follow them. All help aside, we still end up in a very unsavory looking town and decide to ditch this plan and drive straight out to Palmira. We drove………….way out into middle Syria. There is NOTHING on the way to this place but a sign telling us we are equal distance from Bagdad as we are to our destination. Interesting! Once we reach Palmira we realize that it is well worth the journey. This is a massive site with ruins that overlap many eras and includes Assyrian, Greek and Roman ruins. We arrive around noon and it is 100 degrees so we decide to have some lunch while we wait for the heat of the day to pass. We finish our lunch, find a hotel with a view of the ruins and then make our way out to the site. There is so much to see here. You could explore for days and days. We stayed until the sun set and then headed back to our hotel.

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