Lebanon Travel Guide

I know when people hear "Beirut" they automatically think "war" and "terrorism" and all that stereotypic crap. Ok, it's not the safest place to live but despite what you see or here in the news about Lebanon it's one of the most beautiful places I've ever been in my life. First off all that fighting bullshit happens mainly in the Muslim part of town which is near the airport hence why it gets closed down a lot. My family lives in the Christian part of Beirut. Just like any european country its got small roads when you go into the residential areas but they've got large smooth highways to get you to wherever you need. There's this huge like 5 or 6 story mall that has anything you could imagine. The food there is absolutely incredible! I don't even know how to describe it it's just something that needs to be experienced. For people who are smokers you'll love the fact that they don't have any rules about smoking under umbrella's or even indoors! Yes, you could fully walk inside a mall... smoking a cigarette. I loved this when I was there since I was a smoker then. The beaches were just awesome and not to mention the beautiful sunrise over the mountains every morning and the sun setting over water every evening. I haven't even gotten to the best part. The nightlife. I've never ever been to the kind of parties i've been to in Beirut. This one nightclub I recommend to anyone going there is called BO18. It's an afterhours underground sort of place it opens around 3AM and you dance til sunrise. The craziest part is that the roof to the whole club opens and closes occasionally so you literally dance under the sunrise. It's insane! In the summer time they have these big events at this massive beach park and we went there after we left BO18 around 8 in the morning. Went home, changed into our swimsuits and were off to the beach where theres MORE dancing and we stayed there til the sunset again ending off with fireworks... it was literally the most gorgeous site i've seen. Fireworks are big there... you'll see fireworks being done on any night of the week.. For whatever reason.. birthdays, weddings... they take those kinds of celebration seriously. They make a huge deal out of it.. I saw this one wedding going down and the bride was sitting on top of this white car looking absolutely glamorous and super done-up. I was like woah! Take it eeeeasyy! Theres like way more amazing stuff about this country I experienced than I could ever type out in this travel tip thing... but the point I'd like to get across is that it's not the country CNN is trying to make it out to be... It's the country both my parents were born in and I'm proud of it! End.

Before I went here, I read that Baalbeck used to be a Hezbollah stronghold. This is still the case, as one cannot fail to notice several kilometers of posters of martyred fighters, neatly posted in the middle of the road, accompanied by Hezbollah flags. In the past, many westerners were kidnapped and held here and the people used to view anyone from the west as a potential spy for Israel.

This doesn't mean that Baalbeck is a place to fear.  The best way to enjoy this nice little city is to cast off all preconceived notions about 'those terrorists' and just meet the people that live there.  You'll find that it's quite a nice town to be in and that there's lots to see.

There is a nice mosque along one of the main roads, with a mirror tile ceiling and a little Hezbollah stand next to it. (You can buy the infamous 'Special force'  1 and 2 games there for about 25 dollars) It certainly isn't the prettiest mosque out there, but it's interesting.

A little further down the same road, you can turn into a smaller street where you'll find a large cut out stone lying in a quarry. According to the locals, it's the biggest hewn-in-one-piece stone on earth, but I have my doubts. It's really not all that interesting.

The towns highlight is definately the Baalbeck ruins, which are remarkably well preserved.  It consists of a grand entrance, and a quite large central court, where you'll find the remains of the temples of Jupiter and Bacchus.  The latter is especially well preserved.  There are also the ruins of the temple of Venus there.  If you want, you can hire a guide here: I believe they have English, French, Spanish and German talking guides there.

Right next to the ruins is what seems to be a Hezbollah infostand, which constantly plays inspirational music. Again, don't be frightened off by this: the people around here will probably only try to sell you T-shirts with the Hezbollah logo on it. 

Just go and enjoy Baalbeck: if you're into historical sights, this is definately for you.

In Beirut you can spend a whole month, eating every day a different sort of breakfast and not have the same one again: - manakish (pizza like bread with topping): zaatar, cheese, kishk, meat (lahmagin), ham and cheese, and mixed varieties, etc., then after trying the regular dough, try the sage (inverted wok type gril), - croissant: plain, zaatar (thyme), cheese, chocolate, almonds, ham and cheese, etc. - fool, hummos, balilah, fatteh, served with a large variety of vegetables (crudites) including green mint, radish, tomatoes, olives, pickles, with fresh baked pita bread. - knafeh (sweet cake with melted cheese and syrup) served in the morning at sweets/pastries shops.  Some arabic sweets shops have meet pies made with millefeuille type pastry, available also in meatless (soy based) variety. - at home or even in smaller restaurant variety of eggs are served: brisht, omelettes, fried.  Local flavors, include olive oil fried eggs, eggs with Sumak, mint, with kawarma (confit de mouton?) - kishk (porridge?) eaten with kawarma.  Sah ' lab served with kaak - kaak: brick oven dough bread (available in several varieties) eaten with zaatar and / or cheese. - home style breakfast: labneh, varitey of local cheese including haloumy, akkawi, majdouleh, chankliche, Picon, la vache qui rit are local favourites, olives, zaatar, martadella (bologna) etc. The nice thing about most of the above meals is that you can have them while driving your car, holding the wheel in one hand, the sandwich in the other, having a sip of pepsi  with another hand, and squeezing a pickles in your mouth from time to time and spitting the olive pit between bites.