Syria - Aleppo, Agatha Christie and the Baron Hotel

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20 Aug - we're officially in the Middle East now, wow. Syria always seemed to me to be such a mystical, ancient and biblical place and relatively unvisited by western tourists...all of this appears to be true, although there are lots of Iraqi tourists here. We meet Hussain, our excellent tour guide for all of Syria. We'll be in the country for 5 days, so really looking forward to getting to know more about this elusive country.

We arrive in Aleppo late afternoon, the second biggest city in Syria, after Damascus. The drivers are MANIC and it reminds me of being in Cairo. We're staying in a quaint courtyard centred hotel in the Armenian quarter of the town, down a wee alley. A great meal in a close by restaurant with a huge selection of mezze and mixed shish. Few extra beers on the way home.

21 Aug - we explore Aleppo Citadel this morning, the biggest fortification in the world. Looked a wee bit like Edinburgh Castle from the outside but it includes two mosques, a hammam, throne room and moat! This is the first of several Crusader type castles we will visit - all are well protected, main entrance is to the right rather than straight ahead to take your attackers by surprise, numerous slits to hail down arrows on them as they approach, secret passageways and holes in the ceiling to pour hot oil onto them when they attack - vicious bunch!

V hot so we stop off at a nearby cafe for an extremely refreshing and tasty mint lemonade - must try this at home, prob best with the M&S cloudy lemonade and just add lots of sprigs of mint, yum 😊 We then explore the Aleppo Souk. A souk is more than just the 'local shops', it's a vibrant community and a great way to experience local life with lots of people living and working in the warren of alleyways. Everyone is trying to grab your attention and make you buy. Aleppo is good for silk purchases so I gave into a persistent (and quite cute!) guy and bought two, gorgeous silk tops - one in lilac (what a surprise) and one in red. My haggling skills aren't the best but brought the shopkeeper down a wee bit and got them for GBP 12 each. Ali's haggling skills however are much more advanced and she bought a wonderful, unusual rope-type necklace after the owner showed us EVERY necklace in the shop and we drank flower tea. We also take time out to have a quick tour round a mental hospital - might seem like a strange idea but interesting and very relaxing, honest!

Headed to the Baron Hotel mid afternoon and lo and behold, some of our group are there. This, now rather shabby, hotel has had such famous guests as Agatha Christie, TE Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) and Teddy Roosevelt. We met Walid, who has been the owner for over 40 years and had a whirlwind tour of the rooms, including the writing desk where Agatha Christie penned some of her novels. Ali and I ended up propping up the bar for hours, long after the others had left, drinking beers and then G&T's. We decided 'eating was cheating' and therefore missed the group meal and staggered back to our hotel about 10pm 😊

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Photos

Aleppo Citadel
Note the Celtic hat!!!