Castle out my window!

Middle East » Syria
April 14th 2006

Published: June 16th 2017

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jc80

01 Ruins

Ruins out the window of the bus, taken near Palmyra.

Geo: 35.1608, 37.0257

Tonight we would be staying in a really romantic location, Fahed got quite excited each time he told us about it. We reached Krak mid-morning and went to the castle. The castle is called Krak Des Chevaliers and was built in 1031ish. It is considered to be the greatest fortress in the world and sits on a 650 metre high cliff. Fahed gave us a tour of the castle, which meant that we power walked through it all and stopped in the shade when he wanted to tell us something. It is strange that a Syrian hated standing in the sun. It was an unreal castle. Really huge and most of it was not closed to the public. We had a great view up here of the surrounding villages. On a clear day it is possible to see the Mediterranean sea, but not today. But from up here we could see our hotel, which was in a great location! Hopefully it's a nice hotel.

This castle was fantastic. Just wished we had more time to explorer it. We ate a buffet lunch at a restaurant next to the castle. After lunch we had the choice to spend more time

02 Castle

The castle we are going to visit. The houses seem unfinished, but that is how they are, ready to continute building when they can afford to.

at the castle and then walk back to the hotel or go back to the hotel. Most of us went to the hotel. All our rooms had the great view of the castle. We had most of the afternoon free. We were isolated, no nearby town that we could walk to. I just relaxed in my room and watched some TV.

We met in the lobby that night. Fahed was taking us somewhere for dinner. We drove past many restaurants. Finally we arrived at the one he wanted to take us to and it was closed!! I was starving- anywhere will do!! We finally found somewhere to eat. It was a very average meal- unimpressive. On the way to the restaurant someone had noticed a chocolate shop, so after we had eaten we went for a walk to find the chocolate shop. 20 minutes later we found it and it also sold alcohol- bonus! They didn't have any mint chocolate, I am having a lot of trouble trying to find minty chocolate during the last few weeks. So I bought some Breezers instead. When we got back I sat on the balcony with the guys and we had a few