Heliopolis Palmyra

... with the fluff out of his face.<br><br>An additional information: Petrol in the area (Lebanon, Syria, etc.) costs around 10-15 euro cents.<br><br>We left Palmyra heading south to Jordan. In Damascus Helmut again made friends with some crazy guy, which was descreetly ignored by Manuel after he tried to start a conversation with the words: Hey BLONDIE! Where do you think you are going?<br>Let's see, how things will get here!<br><br>love HelMan

... said I need to have my own transport to go to them. Then I asked what if I walked, and he said then I could only go for one. So I bought for the one only. Later on though I realized both tombs are pretty walkable distance and I wondered why he said that I could only buy a ticket for only one of the tombs if I walked. I guess I haven woken up yet tha morning but I didnt bother going back to ask the guy who was pretty unfriendly. The musuem itself was nothing much to be ...

... the nearby hill.<br><br>Half an hour later we three, along with about 50 other tourists, were perched on the crest of the hill just behind the citadel (not part of the ruins and apparently not worth its meager entry fee), eagerly counting down the minutes. We were a bit discomfited to observe that we couldn't tell exactly where the horizon was for the thick band of haze over the region where blue should meet yellow. We were all the more so when the sun ...

Some long overdue pictures from my trip - just the ones that I like the most so far - why have I not posted any sooner? Sorry, I tend to be a bit pedantic about my pictures sometimes, as someone who enjoys photography I like to review and edit pictures before I publish them.<br><br>Not many with me in them, a few from the group have some that will probably make it onto Facebook, when I take photos I prefer to focus on scenic shots, usually with few or no people in them....<br>

... to the door to the roof bang, the wedding procession drive past this time with a bus adding to its convoy of noise as her sheets got blown off by the wind at 3 am in the morning. <br>At 4.30 our alarm went off and off we set with bleary eyes to see the sun rise over the ruins of Palmyra. Even at this time we had a couple of camel drivers asking if we wanted to pay for a lift "No, we just want to walk." We climbed up an ancient tower to watch the sun rise, how stable it was we don ...

... but to the south we could see a dozen or more sandstone towers, some as high as 4 stories, standing mute against the mountain backdrop.<br><br>After what seemed like hundreds of photos of the ruins at sunset we hitched a ride back down the mountain into town, just in time to avoid an approaching sandstorm. As we had first set off for the citidel we had passed a taxi driver who offered us a lift &#8211; when we told him we were going to walk up he said &#8220;walk up ...

... and the cave in which Abraham was born. Very crowded city and quite polluted but it was still interesting none-the-less. The border crossing from Turkey to Syria was time consuming but uneventful. There were a total of four security check points and numerous forms to fill out. It took around 1.5 hours in total I believe. The first few days were spent in Aleppo. Amazing city which is very well preserved. Our hotel was centrally located near the Sheraton (for ...

... The alternate name is Tadmor (Hebrew) and there are various references to this town in the bible. This was a town with some very crafty people. They managed to live alongside the Romans by pretending to be Romans. Ships travelled all over the Mediterranean and even Hadrian visited. This, of course, resulted in yet another Hadrian's Arch. Sigh, that must be the 20th by now. Hadrian was so impressed that he made the city a tax free state linking China ...

So Lattakia was a good time but it was time to move on. I failed to mention that the main drag is nicknamed "American Street" because of all the cafes and such that have opened along the street in the past 7 years or so. Ironically, one block away is Baghdad street. A little bit of political harmony right here in Syria. <br><br>My next destination would be at al'Hosn, which is the small town near Krak des Chevaliers. Unfortunately, no bus went there from ...