Krak des Chevaliers – 5 Americans + 1 crusader castle
As we prepared to leave Palmyra we met 3 other Americans with a similar itinerary so together we hired a driver and mini-bus to take us from Palmyra to Krak des Chevaliers, one of the most famous Crusader castles in the world, and then to Hama to stay a couple nights there. More importantly, we were all on a mission to attend Asia Champions League soccer match between the local Homs teamand Saba from Iran (but you’ll have to read the next blog entry for that)….
It turned out to be a really interesting group as one guy was an Indian-American recent graduate of Columbia University doing some neat non-profit education work in New York City, and the other two were a middle-20´s Jewish couple from D.C. who worked for the State Department and World Bank. It goes without saying, but I´ll say it anway, that given all our various our backgrounds and where we were traveling we had lots of interesting conversations about Syria, the Middle East, the USA´s role in what´s going on in the Middle East and the world, etc.
Krak was pretty much as amazing as advertised as it´s in great shape and stands powerfully on a hill top overlooking a vast area of Western Syria. Again, we had just about reached our limit of appreciating Crusader castles but Krak definitely was the most impressive we had seen and therefore we managed enough enthusiasm to take pictures of castles one last time. We all enjoyed a great lunch together and then hopped back in the mini bus to be taken to Hama.
Hama is not an overly interesting city and the only real tourist draw is a few enormous water wheels on the river that once served as the only way in which water from the river was lifted out and distributed around the city through a network of aquaducts. However, our main reason for spending a couple nights in Hama was not to see the water wheels. We stayed in Hama to use it as a base for going to a very important Asia Champions League soccer match the following night in the nearby city of Homs between the local Homs team and Saba from Iran. Syria versus Iran – kind of makes you think about who to cheer for doesn´t it?…find out who we cheered for in the next entry 🙂
For pictures:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/shanlovesphotos/sets/72057594139211916/
-Anthony
Tags: Krak des Chevaliers, Middle East, Syria, Travel
Shan
July 11th, 2006 at 9:30 pm
Too many cities, too many cultures, too many systems, lots of thinking, maybe some changes.
Mom