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Published: October 19th 2007
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"We advise against non-essential and tourist travel to Lebanon as there is high risk to your safety in most parts of the country. We advise against all travel to southern Lebanon (south of Litani River) as there is an extreme risk to your safety in this area." -MFAT warning
After having been to Lebanon, I thought I may as well check out the NZ government's travel warnings. Well after reading that joke, I couldn't think of a better place to have gone than Lebanon. The only danger that we experienced was the crazy crazy drivers. They're all over the road, in any odd lane, don't slow down and it seems like they don't see cyclists.
On arrival at the Jordan-Syrian border zone, I had read that because of my Dutch (and any other nationality with a Syrian consulate) passport that I MUST secure a visa in advance otherwise I wouldn't get in. This was also stated at the border office. But Syrian policies can always be evaded, no bribe necessary, just a smile, a big thanks and we got through no problem. Any evidence that we'd been to Israel would also deny us entry, but we had no stamps
Damascus
with Assad so no problem and no questions asked. However while waiting at the passport control office I had a heap of Israeli travel documents in my pockets along with Israeli money, but managed to secretly discard them into the Syrian bins as I stood in line. They saw nothing.
So we got into Syria. We'd rode to the border and across the border and to some undesirable city just inside the border but then opted for a Syrian local bus tour to Damascus- and the road was a bit of a long straighter with a desert look to it. Damascus was great though. Probably one of the most interesting places I've ever been to and it was really quite liberal which was surprising- probably largely thanks to its large Christian community. It's considered the oldest city in the world, at least in terms of being constantly inhabited. It's got plenty of ruins, a fantastic walled old city, a huge citadel, plenty of impressive mosques and then huge western looking boulevards with a bustling university scene. Considered an enemy state by George Bush, Syria was great and the people really nice. We spent two nights here wondering around and meeting locals.
I totally rate it.
Next on the cards was the Lebanese border by bike. We followed some gorge out of the city- it was nice enough but acted like a fume funnel and it was up hill. The road to Lebanon was all a bit airy- Syrian troops had been forced to withdrawal from the country a couple of years ago so the road was pretty much a military zone and there wasn't a lot of traffic. But we enjoyed it of course.
Getting into Lebanon was no problem. The Syrian side was on the top of a hill and the Lebanese on the bottom so that was alright. After getting our visas however, passport control man asked me about the beard and the fact that my passport photo looked nothing like me and then insisted that I "look like a terrorist". Well thanks mate: welcome to Lebanon aye? The rest of the day we spent cycling along eastern Lebanon through the Beeka Valley (the Hezbollah area) to some old Ruins at Baalbek; the traffic was double chaos.
Next day I brought myself a Hezbollah T-Shirt and we looked around the old Roman sight. Later on we
Damascus
main market drag decided to take a bus over the mountains and over the bombed out bridges to Beirut. We decided that biking up hill in that traffic madness probably wasn't the best and time wasn't really on our side either.
Beirut was cool enough. It's located on a great spot along the Mediterranean, and it's a really diverse place in terms of religious communities, economic development and landscape. Scars from its many wars are pretty noticeable and its pretty well guarded no thanks to its current political crisis. The touristy city centre was totally dead and we saw no tour buses. But we had a good look around its various areas from the more Islamic areas to the highly westernised port, seaside and central areas.
The small Lebanese old port town of Byblos was next. Riding out of Beirut was a triple nightmare of motorway and traffic, but we soon found the scenic coastal route and decided to stick to it.
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Brititi
non-member comment
I have been trying to tell you all along that you look like a terrorist with that beard!