Posts
I visited Cassie in Beirut, Lebanon over winter break. It's taken some time to get this posted as I do most of my reportage over on Facebook these days
Cassie with the Mediterranean Sea in the background.
The remains of a Roman bathhouse in Beirut.
The famed Corniche. In the distance are snow covered peaks where ski resorts are found.
The infamous Holiday Inn Beirut, one of the high places fought over in the "Battle of the Hotels" in the mid-1970s. Vanquished defenders were thrown from the roof whenever the property changed hands. Pocked with bullet holes and scarred by fire it remains a sad monument to the civil war.
But for the minaret, this holiday scene wouldn't be out of place in Hanoi, Seoul, Minneapolis, or Prescott.
The remains of "The Egg" - a movie theater project interrupted and then battered by the civil war - lies abandoned across the street from the beautiful Mohammad Al-Amin Mosque.
I'm pretty sure I ate more mashed up garbonzo beans (hummus) in the past two weeks than I have in my previous 60 years! Next to the bowl of the ever present dip are a meat filled pastry that is a local Baalbek specialty. Yes, that's an ash tray on the table. Smoking appears to be a national pastime in Lebanon.
The remains of a column hewn, finished, and polished by hand some 2000 years ago in Baalbek.
This is the quarry where slaves chipped away at the bedrock to free pillars and columns before hauling them a kilometer or two to the site of the Roman temples in Baalbek.
Byblos is the oldest continuously occupied city in the world. This spring was used in Neolithic times.
From the Neolithic Era to the Ottoman Empire in a single photo.
Lunch starters: some assembly required.
The mouth of the Dog River beneath the cliffs of Nahr El Kalb, where Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Greek, Roman, Arab, French, and British armies - whether invaders or liberators - have made a tradition of commemorating their arrival in Lebanon by carving stellae into the limestone cliffs.
The Raouché Rocks as one leaves Beirut to the south.
In the mountains east of Sidon we visited Castle Beaufort, a stronghold used by Crusaders, Muslims, the Ottomans, the PLO, and Israel.
A photo taken by a helpful security officer at the gate to Cassie's school.
Cassandra, thank you for yet another trip of a lifetime. I will follow you anywhere you go for as long as my knees hold out!
