Lebanon Part 2: Jeita Grotto, Harissa, and Byblos

The next day, we took another trip out of town. We did not go as far as the previous day....though the traffic in Beirut is like nothing I've ever seen, and it easily takes an hour to get outside of the city in traffic. First stop was the Jeita Grotto. The Jeita grotto are limestone caves situated in a beautiful valley about 10 miles north of Beirut. They say the caves were inhabited in prehistoric times, then the lower cave was re-discvoered only in 1836 and the upper cave was discovered in 1958. And it was one of the top contenders in the 7 New Wonders of Nature competition.

To get to the upper grotto (top cave), you take a cable car ride from the entrance. 

Once we got inside, photography was not permitted and they made you lock up your cameras. So, this is a picture from the internet, but here is what the upper caves looked like. There was a long walkway to explore the cave, and there were very impressively large stalactite and stalagmites.

                                           

Next, we took a short train ride to the lower grotto, and again had to lock up our cameras inside.

Thank you internet ;). The lower caves were gorgeous, and the best part was we got to take a boat ride through it!

Afterwards, the boys got a necklace with their initial engraved in a stone. Caleb chose and english C and Benjamin chose an arabic B. It was a really beautiful place to visit and fun way to start the day.

Next stop was to the Christian pilgrimage site on Mount Harissa, to see the Our Lady of Lebanon statue and gorgeous views of Jouineh Bay. Our Lady of Lebanon is one of the most important shrines in the world honoring the Virgin Mary, and it stands tall at 8.5m high and 15 tons of bronze. To get to the top, you take a 10 minutes gondola lift, called the Telepherique. You start across the street from the water and gradually ascend, and then the last few minutes is an almost entirely vertical climb to the top.

Wow, what a view from up top!

Heading over to see Our Lady of Lebanon (that I did not take a picture of)!

View from the top of the Our Lady of Lebanon statue.

Heading down....

The Teleferique was definitely a highlight for all of us!

The last stop of the day was to the ancient seaside town of Byblos. It was believed to have been occupied first between 8800 and 7000 BC, and was built as the first city in Phoenicia. The city has been continuously inhabited since 5000 BC, and it is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. We were hungry when we arrived so first order of business was lunch. We ate a lot of really good Lebanese food on this trip!

Then we wandered around the souq and browsed inside many of the shops.

We walked through some pretty gardens on the way to the sea, to see an old castle.

It was such a tropical setting!

There were old churches all around the town.

Byblos castle is a crusader castle sitting on the water, that was built in the 12th century, from limestone and remains of Roman structures. Saladin captured the town and castle in 1188 and tore down the walls in 1190. The Crusaders re-captured Byblos and re-built the castle foundation in 1197.

 

Such a quaint little harbor with small fishing boats.

We were thankful for the opportunity to visit more places around the country Another fun day exploring Lebanon on the books!

Lebanon Part 1: The Cedars and Baatara Gorge

We recently returned from a family vacation to Lebanon and Cyprus. It was such an interesting, restful, and fun trip, and I'll blog about it over the next several posts. We spent 4 nights in Lebanon and 4 nights in Cyprus, and had a great time in both countries. The first few posts will be about Lebanon. We stayed in downtown Beirut, and had a couple of day trips around the country. This first post will be about our day trip to see the Cedars of God and Baatara Gorge.

The Cedars of God, referenced throughout the Old Testament, is a forest of cedar trees that once covered much of Lebanon in ancient times. Their timber was used by the Phoenicians, Israelites, Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Romans, and the Turks. Today, only a few very small cedar forests exist. The forest we visited, called the Cedars of God, was a few hours outside of Beirut. It was such a neat opportunity to see this beautiful country. As we got further into the middle of the country, we drove through the mountains, and little quaint villages. It is is green, mountainous, and lush! In the winter, skiing is popular and people from around the region come here to enjoy the snow.

A nice view along the way.

The Cedars of God...

We hiked along a path and looked at the giant cedar trees, that are said to be as old as 6,000 years old. At the top, there was a giant tree with no leaves, and a church. Pretty much every place we visited had a church at the tourist site, which is something we are not used to seeing in this part of the world.

A nearby town by the forest. What an amazing view these people have!!

Hiking back down to the entrance.

Pit stop to write their names in the dirt.

It was a beautiful day and really neat place to visit!

Before taking another long car ride, we got some snacks and souvenirs at the shopping area.

Another view of the lush mountains, on the way to the gorge.

Baatara gorge has a 830ft waterfall at the bottom of the gorge, that drops into a sinkhole in to the Cave of Three Bridges, on the Mount Lebanon trail. During the spring melt, the water is plentiful, but unfortunately it was completely dried up when we visited! This gorge was only discovered in 1952, and the waterfall and sinkhole were not mapped until the 1980s, when it was determined where the water came from. Lots of unique looking flowers...but watch out for the thorns. Poor Caleb fell into a plant and got a handful of thorns :(.

We took what they called an 'air chair' to the bottom - like a ski lift, but the boys thought air chair was more fun to say.

Normally, there would be a cascading waterfall dropping down the hole.

The path to get to the other side was kind of narrow and rocky, so we looked from afar, got a snack, and headed back to the top on the air chair.

Nathan walked up and we rode.

It was a neat experience to see the mountainous countryside, and the boys were troopers because we were in the car for close to 6 hours that day!

When we got back to the hotel, we hopped in a cab and went to the Corniche, which is a really nice pathway along the Med. We saw people walking, biking, and running (in shorts and tank tops)!!

And a bunch of dudes hanging out on the rocks. It seemed weird, but there was a beautiful sunset behind us, so maybe they were all coming to watch? 

Going down...

We had a great first day exploring Lebanon!

Ladies Getaway at the Dead Sea

This past weekend, I went to the Dead Sea for the night with a couple of my girlfriends. It's been a busy summer, and Nathan was so sweet to let me go relax. 

Floating in the sea felt surprisingly refreshing, even in the 110 degree weather!

Then we got mudded up.

And floated again!

It was a hazy day, but still a beautiful sunset. This is the adults pool that we usually can't visit with the kids. The view is nice, but I think the family pool was way  more fun!

Beautiful morning the next day!

Before breakfast, my friend had the great idea to do an aqua jog for 30 minutes and it felt great!

The sea was so clear in the morning.

Such a fun and relaxing night away! Thank you Nathan :)

Jump Park and Talent Show

We went back to the fun jump park near our house, with some friends last week. The boys (and I), love jumping and having fun there!

They have all kinds of trampolines, this one goes into a foam pit.

Fun rock climbing wall. We are thankful to have this fun place just a few miles from the house!

This week at summer camp, the kids learned about talent and at the end of the week they had a talent show! Both boys recited poetry from Shel Silverstein. Ben recited a poem with his counselor and Caleb recited a poem with Nathan. So proud of them for getting up in front of the crowd! I was away at the Dead Sea with a couple of friends and was sad I missed it, but Nathan and Tes sent me pictures and a video (which I can't seem to be able to upload). 

 All the kids giving their bow.

 They love playing in the grass!

One more week of summer camp, one week of vacation, then school begins!