From Damascus we hired a car for three nights and drove north east to Palmyra....driving in and getting out of Damascus was a bit of an experience, but nothing compared to arriving in Aleppo a few days later! Palmyra is a few hundred miles across the desert in the direction of the Iraqi border with lots of road signs pointing to Baghdad. It leads to two of the border crossing into Iraq, so as you might expect there is a quite a lot of military presence in this desert, with gun emplacements, firing ranges and all sorts of armoured vehicles noted along the way. We were stopped just once at a check point with no hassle and warm a salam, wa'ah salam (Welcome) along the way.

Palmyra is all about te ruins in the midde of the desert. Standing on a major trading route trade has gone on here for over 3000 years. The ruins stretch for several kilometers and are overloked by a ruined Arabi Castle. At one end stands the temple to Baal, going back to pre Roman times. Ruined by earthquake, it remains impressive. The columns in the photo with this blog are from this temple, standing the test of time, war and earthquakes.

A olonade runs for several kilmeters to another temple at the other end, later the place of the roman governer and formal ceremony. Lots and lots of archealogical and historical detail in this place, but we will let you read the book!