Sidon & Tyre

16 October 2004

Taking a day-trip

I loved my Middle Eastern or Mediterranean breakfasts!  Tomato, cucumber, cheeses, hard boiled eggs, bread, cake, strong coffee/tea and the token cornflakes perhaps to make the selection more “international”.

Fiona didn’t seem too comfortable with the food and stuck to the mini French bread, toasted and buttered with tomato slices on top.  Pat had felt faint this morning and didn’t come down, so Fiona brought some tea up to him.

After breakfast, we packed up and changed room.  Kim had slipped on the our dangerous bath split-level bath-tub which had a slope between the two halves.  He was eager not to repeat the act and asked for a room without such kind of bath.

We ventured out of the hotel at 0900 to look for a car and driver to take us places.  We had been quoted USD30 to take us to Sidon and back.  We settled on friendly English-speaking Zakaria in his white V8 Chevrolet, who quoted USD60 for a trip to Sidon and Tyre.  He was once a driver for the US Embassy.

Taking the coastal route south, we made a brief stop at Pigeon Rocks which we missed from the plane yesterday.

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Sidon

The drive to Sidon (Saida) took us through banana plantations and orange groves.  I was told some of the fruit were tangerines called Yusuf Effendi.

Upon arrival at Sidon we went to Sidon Sea Castle, built by Crusaders in the 13th Century.  We were able to enter and climb up one of the towers for a view of the harbour and town.  We continued to the souq nearby.  While we found Debbane Palace, an Arab-Ottoman mansion, we had trouble finding locating the Al Omary Great Mosque.  We found a mosque but couldn’t confirm if it was the right one.

We continued to Khan Al Franj where we had tea.  This caravanserai was built in the 17th Century to stimulate trade with France.  The lower level operated as a trading centre while the upstairs as the accommodation for traders.  In the 19th Century it was used by France as its consulate.

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Tyre

We continued our drive south to Tyre (Sour).  Southern Lebanon is rather Shia and may be considered Hezbollah-land.  There were lots of posters on street lamp-posts of Palestinian martyrs (mainly Sunni?), Ayatollah Khomeini (Shia) and other religious leaders.  It’s a bit complex and my understanding fails me regarding the Shia and Sunni aspects.

At Tyre, we were ready for lunch but being Ramadhan, food was hard to find.  We went to a café and a man went out to get shwarmas for us.

With food in our belly we went to the ruins of Al Mina.  This site is referred to as the old Egyptian port but has Roman ruins from the 2nd century AD. The ruins continue into the submerged harbour but we couldn’t access it.

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From here, we headed inland to the Al Bass ruins.  This one was notable for its old Roman road and archway.  They probably date from 2nd century AD.  Adjacent to Al Bass is the hippodrome which once held 20000 spectators.

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On the way back to the city we stopped for drinks and some cakes and Arabic sweets.  We met with a large traffic jam near the airport.  In fact, we were stationary for quite a while in a tunnel which seemed to be under the airport runway and I was wary of carbon monoxide poisoning!

As we arrived back into the city, I asked Zakaria to drive along the Green Line which was the area that saw the most fighting and damage during the war.  It represented the demarcation between the Muslim and Christian factions but it was more complex than that, with more than just two warring parties.  There were still plenty of damaged buildings but some have now been repaired.

Here, we saw a policeman throwing crates of grapes on to the pavement and smashing the crates.  I guess that’s the way illegal street vendors are dealt with here.  A tad harsh for my liking.

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We had dinner at Walimat Wardeh restaurant.  The Ramadhan special turned out to be rather substantial.  Starting with salad and mezza, then a greenish brownish blackish lentil soup, then mains before finally having a dessert of pastries.  The date juice was gorgeous!  We had to take the pastries back to the hotel.

 

 

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