Living it large in Lebanon
Trip Start
Sep 04, 2004
1
13
27
Trip End
Jun 30, 2005
Beirut,
Lebanon
Sunday, December 5, 2004
On our first day we discovered that our feet weren't the only smelly things in town when we saw the rubbish piled up along the coast overlooking the famous Pigeon Rocks (bit of an anti-climax). In addition, the Thai restaurant we had been dreaming and drooling about for three weeks had closed down. Damn.
On the second day we put aside our reservations and headed up the coast to Tripoli to gorge on their sweets
A Glowing Sarah
. Enlivened by the sugar rush we ran around their Crusader castle and finished the day in Byblos drinking beer overlooking the harbour after a scoot around Roman ruins. Sweet. Continued this theme the next day at Balbeck and again the following day at Saida and Sour in the south. All up, lots of Roman ruins and we kept to this European theme by eating Italian and French (well, there is a loose theme there) on all nights - basically, we craved anything that wasn't Middle Eastern.Lebanon is great, the sites are breath-taking, the weather most pleasant, the people warm and welcoming and the food wonderful. If anyone has got a free long weekend between now and eternity, then spend it in Beirut (you won't regret it).
The only points of general interest to those of you who might consider going or those (few) who are worried about Combie and Sarah's mortal and mental well being are transport related observations.
Firstly, Beruit has all the external indicators of a super-efficent modern city with all the skyscrapers, fancy restaurants and people dispensing soap in washrooms, who Combie refuses to tip. This veneer is waifer-thin and no-where is this better illustrated than in the simple task of walking around town. In short, you can't. Our hotel is only 400 meters from downtown but everytime we want to go there, we have to cross three mototrways to get there. Now this doesn't mean walking across flyways, but involves shutting your eyes and just 'going for it' across six lanes as vehicles hurtle past you. The only way to cross with any degree of safety is to wait for a local to come along and (in the hope that they know the score) follow in their shadow as they 'go for it' as vehicles hurtle past, in much the same fashion as you would have done in the first place
Crusaders Castle, Saida
. This is a town for drivers, mind you only local drivers. It is not recommended that tourists rent cars in this mad-house.Secondly, don't spend too long loitering at the side of these motorways, or any road for that matter. NEVER EVER. Minibuses and taxis continually roam the street sounding their horns at any person within 50 yards of the side of the road, in the hope of enticing them aboard. People who get caught are swept up by minibus or taxi drivers and never seen again. 'Callers' are employed to emphasise the virtues of each destination; "Tripoli - sweets, sea and loose women" (you know the kind of thing)and such is their effectivness that women in the middle of feeding their family have been 'called', boarded the bus and sat there goggle eyed, no doubt wondering within 5 minutes, "why the fuck am I on the bus to Tripoli". You have been warned....
Speak to you all from Jordan.
Combie and Sarah
P.S. You have never known pleasure until, having been denied access to trash journalism for three months, you discover that Beruit's Virgin Megastore is open until midnight and stocks Now, Heat, OK and Hello etc. and provides on-site access to all CDs for 'Customers'. While we didn't spend a penny, we have been their best 'Customers' for the past 5 days and we are eternally grateful to Richard Branson for confiming that Darren Day is indeed a love rat, that Kerry McFadden is 'so over' Bryan, but will always love him. Now if only they would open some Megastores in Damascus, Amman and Cairo that would be nice.
