We ended up croosing the border between Turkey and Syria around 930 pm, that was the plan because it shouldn't be too busy and it should be a "quick" crossing. We sat in Turkey for over an hour, we all had to pile off the truck go to a window and have our passports stamped, then back on the truck we waited while the Turkish customs officers tried to charge our drivers extra fees for taking the truck across. Eventually an agreement was reached and were able to cross (in the meantime we all illeaglly changed money with a random man right in front of the custom agents!) There is a 10km strech between Turkey and Syria and there just happens to be a massive duty free shop that only takes foreign currencies, since Syria isn't the easiest place to obtain alcohol we all stocked up for soooo cheap. Then we sat at the Syrian border for 2 hours. But apparently that is the fastest that our drivers have ever got through that border so - yeah for us! We turned up at the campsite (if you can call it that, it was someones front yard) at 230am. We took a tour of Allepo the next day and it was frantic, the city has 4 million people and I think we saw all of them!! The people are very friendly, we get a few stares (because I don't cover my head or ankles) but other than that most just want to practice english and find out what you think of Syria. In Allepo we visited the Souks, which are massive covered markets that sell everything (including whole camels and illeagal prescription drugs!). It was so packed with people as well and I think we were the only foreign tourists so we got alot of attention. We visted the citadel/fort in the afternoon and it was very impressive. Again it was all so huge, massive storage for when they were under attack, and lots of sercret passages. Our drivers took us to a "special" street for dinner that night and we were each given 50 Syrian pounds (about 1 USD). Dan and I could have had 3 flafels each and still have 5 SP left over (we were stuffed after 2)!
Next day was mostly driving, we stopped around lunch time for provisions and what a shock we got. We must have stopped somewhere that gets NO tourist because everyone came out to stare and say hello, it actually made it quite difficult to buy our food. We also got totally ripped off, becuase the spoke little english and us no arabic, so it was tough to argue. Next stop was another ruined city to eat our lunch, Al Raffasa. It was beautiful and we were the only ones there (a bit out of the way), we were able to explore and climb up the walls to see the view. That night we bushed camp in the middle of the desert, the atmosphere was awesome, dinner went well and there was an almost full moon, scary to say I actually enjoyed myslef.
I'm not going to lie, I don't like camping but I'm trying, seeing as I have to do it for the next 5 months. So here is a plea, anyone who actually likes camping explain it to me and send me easy to cook receipes (only have a gas stove top)!!!!!!!!
Next day we were to go to Palmyra which was only 150km from where we camped, it took us six hours to get there!! Dan and a few other boys were actually getting quite concerned with how far north we were going, seeing as we were meant to be heading south! The drivers eventually admitted to being lost while we stopped for desiel. I have to admit it was getting worrying how many Iraq signs we were seeing! We did however make it to Palmyra and it was so beautiful. Our local guide took us to the Valley of the Tombs and we actually got to go in one that isn't opened to tourists. The tomb was only discovered in the 80's when Iraq was putting through an oil pipe (they still finished the pipe) but it was the most amazing thing I've seen. All the sculptures were untouched and in perfect condtion, and we could actually see in to the childrens tomb that still has all the skeletons of the children. The ruined city itself was huge and there is giant archway that all the caravans of camels would've passed under (up to 4000 camels) still in nearly perfect condition. It's hard to believe that these cities are abandonned and then completely forgotton about.
Following day we visit Krac des Chevaliers, which was built by the crusaders, Richard the Lion heart ruled there for a while. Again it's big, it actually looks quite small from a distance but once again massive. Once again we were impressed, our guide said that it is the best castle in the world, it's got to be up there. The coolest part is that we actually got to explore the secret passages!!!!
We then drove on, after a beautiful lunch, to Damascus, the oldest continusly inhabited city in the world, and it looks it. It is very busy, traffic everywhere, and once again you can buy anything!! We visited the Umayyad Mosque. It is beautiful with a large court yard and the tomb of Salahuddin. I has forced to where a horrible smock thing with a hood and Dan kept getting stares because I was walking ahead of him, too bad, he kept stopping to take pictures! We have one more night in Damascusa and then on to Jordan!!!
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