Palmyra - Syria

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Palmyra -
Time now for some Roman ruins and a history lesson.
After leaving our desert camp in Wadi Rum we drove further North into Syria until we arrived at the ruins of Palmyra which is also the name of the adjacent town. Palmyra dates to before the 1st century BC with many of the ruins and monuments having been built during the reign of the Nabateans and eventually the Romans invaded and conquered the area and built what must have been a magnificent outpost of the Roman Empire. We spent the afternoon wandering the site and eventually made our way to the town for coffee, Internet and food for those that wanted to eat. I was keen to go back to the ruins to get some late light photographs as the sun set so I left the group and walked back. The sunset wasn’t very spectacular because of some cloud on the horizon but the photography was still better than the middle of the day.

Our camp that night was to be a “desert camp” out under the stars near the Tombs that were built by the Nabateans. Nick our driver decided not to wait for me to return to the truck and he picked me up from Palmyra on the way to our camp. Shortly after we arrived at our campsite we were visited by a family of Bedouins on their motorcycle with the inevitable offer to sell us some genuine Bedouin products. No one seemed interested in purchasing however Tracy gave them some of our surplus food, some bread and vegetables. I contributed a packet of Tang and a bottle of water after the small boy of the family asked for my can of coke, I had to refuse as I had already added some Whisky.

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