Aleppo

Our final Syrian destination - an odd country with some serious fashion issues and a disturbing dependance on nasty hair products, but with some fascinating historical sites. Aleppo competes with Damascus as being one of the oldest continously inhabited cites in the world and apparently its souk is the largest covered market in the world. Our hotel was quite atmoshperic and situated within the old city walls. Being the festival of Eid following Ramadan pretty much everything was closed which made the souk quite spookily quiet and deserted but also gave you the opportunity to appreciate the centuries old Islamic architecture. A pretty impressive Citadel too. We managed to cause a bit of a riot when Chris befriended a couple of the questionably dressed local lads and all of a sudden a whole gang of them were clamouring to get their photos taken. Quite Amusing. Once again a great local guide giving us the history, a real character.

Krac de Chevaliers

Another crusader castle, looking very impressive on a hilltop. We had a great view of it from our balcony. Again a great local guide for us. The most incredible thing was the English Gothic cloisters so far away from Britain and the emblem of Richard the Lionheart. I'd read about the crusades but being stuck out in Syria which still seems a million miles from anything familiar, it seemed impossible to imagine our monarch dissapearing off here for a few years - but you see the castle and theres a slice of Norman England in the Middle East.

Roman Stuff - The Sequel

Palmyra

The City of Palmyra was at its heyday around 270 AD when Queen Zenobia (great name!), wrestled it from the Roman Empire and proceeded to build her own Palmyrian Empire which stretched as far as Egypt. Zenobia claimed desecent from Cleopatra and took the title of Queen of Egypt. The Empire was short lived and she was crushed by Emporer Aurelian at Antioch (where I am sitting here typing funnily enough) and then paraded through the streets of Rome in Chains.More info here

Set right out in the desert on the way to Iraq it was a very atmospheric place, and once again we got the benefit of a slighlty eccentric but very knowledegable local guide to give the full background.

Damascus

Internet in Syria has been a little bit questionable and sporadic so hard to make any posts of late. After a fairly lengthy customs process to get out of Jordan and into Syria we arrived in Damnascus, the oldest continously inhabited city in the world. At first we were not sure what was going to occupy us for 2 and a half days but the Old city was quite absobrbing. As usual we found this much more rewarding once we got away fron the group. Just wandering and exploring. The highlight was probably one of the old Khans or Caravan resting places/store rooms - dating from the Otooman period and hidden away in the Souks. We also discovered a medressa and some beautiful old houses, now shops or hotels all incredibly ornate choccas with Islamic art. Did a bit of curio shopping and managed to fit in a Hammam too. From there we piled into taxis and then a public coach and went through the desert to Palmyra.