The sun reached our tent early and forced us to pack and go quickly. This morning, for the first time on this trip, we saw snakes, not one, but two. The first was a water one. We disturbed its basking as we passed along the concrete rim of an artificial pond, and it spryly retreated to the invisible depths of its aquatic habitat. The second was a big, black, terrestrial one that also disappeared in the growth as soon as it noticed us.
The trail followed an irrigation trough amid apple and cherry orchards. At times, there was no space to walk beside it, and we had to balance-tread along its narrow wall. Then it wound to a dirt road and continued through a succession of hamlets.
At some point, a farmer splashed us with a hose by mistake when he spun around without knowing we were there. He apologized and tried to dissuade us from going straight. I understood that much from his gestures, but nothing about the reason we shouldn’t, which he was verbalizing in Arabic. We carried on straight to find out with our eyes. It was just a part of the road missing, washed away by a torrent. We had to bum-slide down a drop and clamber up the other side.
At around noon, we made it to the Lake House. This was an organized campsite near the valley head at the foot of Qurnat as Sawda: the country’s highest peak. We had intended to settle there for some days, leave our stuff, and go on a side expedition to the mountaintop. By then, however, we had called this plan off because of the sniper…
This story is an excerpt from my book "Backpacking Lebanon", wherein I recount my one-month journey around this fascinating country. Check it out if you like what you're reading.
From Beirut already, and all along the route since, everyone we spoke to about our aim to climb the mountain would widen their eyes and start: “No! You can’t! The sniper!” It was about a localized conflict that was ongoing in the area. Inhabitants of two villages, a Christian and a Muslim one on opposite sides of the mountain, had taken up arms against each other over a disputed water source. I couldn’t determine to which faction that particular sniper belonged, but he had attained a distinct, almost mythical notoriety.
Now that this plan was canceled, we wanted to stop at the Lake House for lunch only. But there was no one to open the house, let alone cook. There was a telephone number on a signboard. The answerer knew just enough English to spell out another number. I noted it but decided not to call because… who would want to come now from the village to make us food? It turned out somebody wanted, anxiously. But I found that out much later when I reactivated my phone—which during hikes is by default in airplane mode to conserve battery—to see many missed calls from the number.
Anyhow, we detoured to go to the village ourselves and eat there. And then we also backtracked to look for Sophie’s camera lens cover, which she dropped on the way. Fortunately, we found it by the Lake House. Unfortunately, she lost it a few months later, just days before writing this paragraph.
El Arz was a winter resort village. Aside from old, weeds-consumed, derelict stone houses, the only inhabitable buildings were a few posh chalets. The poshest one, a sizeable edifice with ivies covering its entire facade, maintained the sole restaurant open for summer, and we became its only customers. We eased onto a comfy couch and ordered a pizza and a baked potato. The staff were nice but had the bad habit of fine-dining servers: standing above the table and staring at us blankly while we ate. Besides being frustrating, combined with that poor buck’s taxidermied head watching us from the wall, that was also a little spooky in this case.
The village was livelier near its upper end, where the so-called Cedars of God Reserve was situated. It was a popular destination with an influx of local and foreign tourists second only to Baatara Gorge out of all the places we visited during this trek. The road beside the forest teemed with gift shops selling religious artifacts cut out of cedar wood. Their owners touted to us ardently along our passage but remained sincerely amiable after accepting the impossibility of turning us into customers. One even invited us to camp in his garden, and another hinted to us the location where we later ended up camping.
The entire perimeter of the forest was walled. Looking for a way in, we walked to its uppermost verge where the walls were barbed. This part hosted a military base. A soldier sent us back to the reserve entrance we had missed.
Paying a donation-based entry fee, we entered the wooded area. This one was smaller but even more ravishing than the one in Tannourine. These gargantuan, Methuselan cedars seemed as if taken out of a fairytale. The forest floor was carpeted with colorful flowers and laced with scores of paths. It would be an oneiric camping spot, but overnighting was prohibited.
So we headed back out and made for the place the shop owner had recommended before. After a strenuous up-and-down over rock and thistles, we reached a smaller, isolated cedar grove further up the mountain and settled for a sweet sylvan sleep.
Photos
View (and if you want use) all my photographs from El Arz and the Cedars of God.
Accommodation and Activities in Lebanon
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