Middle East Trip 2003: Syria | Lebanon | Jordan | Palestine The Palestinian-Israeli conflict Travelogue
Palmyra
The city of Palmyra holds one of the most stunning roman ruins of Middle East. Located in the middle of the syrian desert, next to an oasis, a place with extreme weather in summer and winter, also holds several nearby settlements of beduins.
The arab castle and the sunset over the syrian desert
Qala'at ibn Maan Castle, built in the century XVII
Even the walls of the castle take a beautiful golden colour thanks to the rays of light of the sunset
From the top of the castle it's possible to see all the ruins of the Old City of Palmyra
The funerary towers from the top of the castle
Prepared to go to the top of the castle...
The sun rays through a crack of the walls of the castle
Inside the castle. At the background the desert where the funerary towers are
David in the castle and the ruins as background
The sunset is best time to enjoy of the views from the castle
The sunset light give a especial colour to the desert that surrounds Palmyra
The ruins of the old Palmyra in the sunrise
Monumental Arch, main entrance of the ruins
The best pictures of the Palmyra ruins are taken during sunrise, for this reason, we went there at 6 a.m.
During the sunrise the weather was more colder and windy that we expected, very different of the temperature during the rest of the day
Temple of Nabo, built in the century I b.C, in honour of Nabo God, the gos of the destinies
The locals know Palmyra as the name Tadmor
Very windy morning, so early!
The sun appearing behind the ruins
The sun appears behind the ruins
The tetraphilon silhouette, with the sun as background
Enjoying the sunrise in an incredible place
The tetraphilon (four big pillars) coincide in the main intersection of Palmyra, where it crosses the Great Columnade with the street that ends in the Bel-Shamin Temple and the Agora
It's founded that one of the pillars of the original tetraphilon (now, it is rebuilt) was brought from Aswan in Egypt
The Great Columnade and the Monumental Arch
Freezing near the tetraphilon
The sun behind a group of columns
Detail of the original sewage system of the city. It was consist of pipes of ceramics surrounded by stone
This is the only that remains of some building
Great Columnade
The funerary towers in the desert from the Palmyra ruins
General view of the ruins
The base of many columns of the ruins are buried in sand
Palmyra ruins
Doorway of the funerary temple, built in the century III
Funerary temple and the castle
Around the funerary temple it was built Dioclethian Camp, where are a lot of ruins to be unearthed
Palmyra ruins
Great Columnade or Cardo Maximus
Dioclethian Baths
Palmyra ruins
Not translated yet: Tetrapilon
There aren't doubts.... it's the tetraphilon
The castle behind two columns of the ruins
The sewage system of the old city
Inside the Agora, the roman forum dedicated to market and government discursions
Corintian column near Senate and the Great Columande
Palmyra ruins
Stage of the theater which have a very good status after the reconstruction
Detail of the stage of the teather
Archs of the doorway of the theater
Main piece of the Monumental Arch. This piece don't look very stable, we hope it will continue in its place for a long time
The funerary towers
In order to visit the funerary towers, the people in charge of the keys have to open each tower, if there is somebody who wants to visit them
The ceiling of the ground floor of the funerary tower of Yemliko
Statues that represent to the people that rest in the towers. It's found that they don't have head because Islam don't admit the represent of people. Other theory is about the tombs thieves that stolen the stone heads
The tower area tomb walls put one over the other until a height of 5 meters
Outside the funerary tower of Yemliko, the biggest we visited
The temple of Bel
main entrace of the temple, where is located the ticket office
Bel was oune of the most important gods of the pantheon of Palmyra
Arabs in the year 1132 become the temple into a fort. For their protection they constructed a wall more weight with the bases of the columns of the inner temple
Courtyard with columns of the temple
Doorway of the main entrace to the sanctuary
It could be a podium for an animals sacrificies, to celebrate purification ceremonies
General view of one of the laterals of the inner temple
Rests of the capitals of the columns
Columns around the temple
Second wall of columns of the temple
Our encounter with a group of friendly beduins near Palmyra
From inside the bedouins tent, the car in which we arrived, a little rickety Mercedes Benz
The main source of incomes is selling of the milk of their flock
They received us with the typical bedouin coffee. It's a black coffee, very hot and bitter (they add it cardamom) nd luckyly short. In orden to followcorrectly the bedouins rules, the cup must be stired three times and drink all the coffee in one
Bedouins found funny to wear the Ahmad and david sun glasses and see their photo in the display of the camera
If one of the brothers had his photo... the other wants one. During the visit we watched the wedding video of this bedouin man who got married one month before
Of course, the third brother also wanted his photo, but it was difficult to control himself :)
Where is the scarf of our friend?
In the head of the adopted bedouin!
A picture of this fantastic group of new friends
Being a woman guest, Yolanda could be in the reserved area in the tent for meeting. The rest of the women were in others rooms and we could not meet them
Ahmad with his friend, the patriarch of the family
Children can be in the meeting room when there are guests
As well as the welcome coffee, we drank tea, ver sweet, and share with them a nargileh (waterpipe)
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