Hamma, Syria

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Then to Hamma - a good base for Aleppo and the Dead Cities, so we stayed for a few days.
It's a small, working town - friendly and pretty, but ( a big but) there was a massacre back in the 80s. Difficult to believe it could have ever have happened while you're actually there, it all seems so relaxed and laid back. Most tourists come for the Nourias - huge wooden wheels that dot the river.
It was so hot - over 47 degrees in the evening - that once we got to the restaurant on the river bank, we just stayed put for the rest of the afternoon and left in the dark...a quiet, magical, yellow lamplit walk back through the town afterwards, with fairground lights strung along the side of the water...

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