Tag Archives: Cedars

The Cedars & North Lebanon’s Mountains

I finally had enough time on my hand to visit one of my favorite places in Lebanon: the Cedar mountains. They are probably the most underrated locations in the country and are nowhere near as visited as they should be because, quite frankly, very few places in this country can rival them in sheer landscape beauty.

Using my iPhone 5′s panorama feature, I was able to capture what I believe are pretty decent shots of the drive up to the mountains, the town of Becharre with its snowy mountainous backdrop, the Cedar Mountains themselves and part of the Kadisha Valley known as Qozhaya on the way back.

These locations may be far from Beirut – about 130 km – but they’re worth every single minute spent driving and every dollar spent in gas. I think I’m lucky that I live nearby and only need about 30 minutes to get there.

The slopes are superior to those of Mzaar/Sectarian-Kfardebyan and while they are less taken care of, they’re much cheaper and you will be able to get your full money’s worth out of them. The people are a whole lot friendlier as well.

So while many Lebanese are overjoyed that some international publication (click here) has chosen Beirut as the #1 city destination of the region – as if that’s a very hard thing to pull off – I felt like I ought to highlight something in Lebanon that is so ahead any form of “best of” competition in this region that it’s #1 always.

North Lebanon Mountains Cedars - 4

The Mountains from the village of Qnat

 

 

North Lebanon Mountains Cedars 13

The view from Hadath el Jebbeh

North Lebanon Mountains Becharre Cedars

Becharre (on the right) with its mountains behind it

North Lebanon Mountains Cedars - 6

The drive up to the Cedar Mountains

North Lebanon Mountains Cedars - 7

Some of Lebanon’s Cedars – not the main forest, obviously

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Panoramic view of part of the mountains

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Part of the Cedar forest

North Lebanon Mountains Cedars Qozhaya

The drive to Qozhaya

 

North Lebanon Mountains Qozhaya Annoubin Kadisha

The view from St. Anthony of Qozhaya convent (on the left) – part of the Kadisha Valley

 

 

 

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Summer in Lebanon: A Trip Through the Lebanese Mountains

After much talk, a few friends and I decided to go on a North Lebanon road trip yesterday that took us through Batroun to Tannourine from which we crossed over to Becharre, descended to the Bekaa and then returned to Ehden.

Massive amounts of driving aside, I took a few pictures that I figured I’d share with you. All of these pictures were taken with a Nikon D5100 and weren’t modified in any way. I’m also not a professional photographer so these aren’t supposed to be perfect – they’re there to show the beauty of the Northern Lebanese mountains.

Some of the cedars at Tannourine

The cedars of Becharre

Residual snow

Lebanon’s highest peak – Kornet el Sawda

The Bekaa valley

Saydet el Hosn – Ehden

And the following picture I took with my iPhone and modified using Camera+:

This is what you see when you’re literally above cloud nine

 

Winter in Lebanon: Snowy Landscapes from the Recent Snowstorm

After posting a few pictures of a trip I took to the Cedars, I figured I’d help show another side of Lebanon that most people don’t get to see (especially tourists). And what better side to show than the one showcased by the recent snowstorm?

I did not take these pictures. I got them, after permission, from the Lebanon Weather Facebook page. I’ll try to go on a roadtrip around the Batroun area soon to take pictures. So stay tuned.

In the meantime, we present:

Zahle

Anjar

Assia, a village at 700 m of altitude in Batroun

The Chouf

The view from Hasroun, in the Bcharre Caza

Jezzine

Kawkaba, in South Lebanon

Knise Moutain in the Metn region

South Lebanon

Toula, in North Lebanon

West Bekaa

West Bekaa, again

And this is a picture my friend Firas took of the Cedar Mountains from his hometown in Koura:

The Cedar Mountains from afar

And people ask me why I’m “hating” on Zaitunay Bay when it’s getting all the attention and scenes like these are getting ignored. I guess that’s the way things are – you have money and power, you get noticed.

 

 

Winter in Lebanon: The Cedars

This past weekend, I decided to go with a couple of my cousins on a quick drive around the beautiful Lebanese North, which happens to be where I’m from.

The area in the pictures below is about a thirty minute drive from my hometown in the Batroun caza and the road is paved with gorgeous scenery as well. I had wanted to post this yesterday but the Telegraph article took precedence. Check out my commentary on that article here.

So in a way, this post will serve as further proof to what I presented in my commentary yesterday. Perhaps what was very surprising to me was that, despite it being a very sunny Saturday, the number of people hitting the Cedar slopes was very little compared to how popular Faraya seems to be even though this is a much nicer area to visit.

Moreover, while driving around these mountains, your mind is taken out of your car and to a whole other place altogether. You cannot simply drive around without forcibly stopping to try and take a picture that barely encompasses the beauty in front of you. They call the Cedar forest in North Lebanon: The Cedars of God. I think I know why it’s called as such: if God wanted to choose a place to live in (during winter), it’d be this.

It’s absolutely breathtaking.

The view from a town on the way: Hadath El Jebbe

Entrance of Bcharre, the city.

View from Bcharre, the city

Church in Bcharre

The Cedar Mountains as seen from Bcharre

Another view of the Cedar Mountains from Bcharre

Leaving Bcharre towards the Cedar Mountains

Note to self: Converses are a bad idea in such circumstances

Awesome house. Can you imagine living here in winter?

Your visit to the Bcharre region won't be the same without 2145 posters of gorgeous Setrida Geagea

The Cedars of Lebanon

The Cedars of Lebanon - again

The snow on the Cedar Mountains

Another view of the snow

The Cedar Forest from afar

 

And then, just before leaving, my cousins decided to remember my brother, Joseph, who happens to be in the US as a foreign exchange student. So this is to Joseph:

All these pictures were taken with my iPhone 4S and were not modified in any way.