Lebanon
Posted at 4:11 PM, Jun. 17, 2010
Well I drew an easier watch tonight (2100 hrs to 2400 hrs) so filling in some time by updating the blog as we motor quietly onwards to Israel – Monday 14th June and we should arrive in at Haifa around 1100 hrs tomorrow. But I need to go back to the last leg first.
Keeping on with the sailing we did manage to score a great sail for the entire leg (only the second time this has happened) on route from Lattakia (Syria) to Jounieh (Lebanon and near Beirut). The leg started off with us pretty much last to leave one of the dirtiest ports we have been in i.e. Lattakia. The Syria Yacht Club occupy one side of the small basin and the other seems to be commercial with some steel boat building going on. Unfortunately the harbour seems to become a good place to dump rubbish of all types and there is a very shallow spot in the middle (1.6 metres only). It is a shame for the yacht club as they are trying to promote yachting in what for them must be a difficult environment. Before we departed they put a diver in to check the propellers, anchors and keels of all yachts - and sure enough the stuff he pulled out certainly averted more disasters of the type that caught a few boats when we arrived. The leg was 105 miles if no windward work was involved but as noted in the last posting this was not going to be a gentlemen’s sail. (for those who don’t know gentlemen never sail to windward – maybe it spills the gin!). Again we were in the last three or four boats to leave and had a good sail ( no tacking) out to the waypoint about 6 miles offshore and then onto starboard tack for the run down the coast. Initially we had to throw in a few tacks to keep our distance beyond the regulation 6 miles offshore requirement but as the wind moved to the west we were able to lay through to the waypoint off Jounieh. By early morning though the wind had freshened to 20 – 25 knots and gone to the south so the last 20 miles to the waypoint were a dead beat i.e. we have to sail 40 miles to cover 20 miles directly unwind. We had a great sail with one reef in the main and a few rolls on the overlapping genoa we have been using during the rally – 8.5 to 8.8 knots upwind seemed respectable. We were one of the few boats to sail all the way as with the scheduled arrival times the smaller boats in this case simply had to throttle hard down and go for it. Rob from the English boat Serefina (a Najad 49) got some good shots of us on the wind.
Good bash to weather!
The sailing has been characterised by poor visibility with significant haze so it was quite a surprise to get a beautiful view of Beirut, sitting on its own headland, emerge as we approached the coast. The marina at the town of Jounieh is pretty classy – four tennis courts (one with a grandstand), a raised Olympic swimming pool with restaurant and bar alongside and various bars on the breakwater with swimming holes, including two actually inside the marina. It was a significant but welcome change from Lattakia – although the Palmyra Bedouin dinner stomach blues tagged along to ensure we did not forget Syria in a hurry.
We arrived in Jounieh on Thursday 10 June, gave the boat a good clean and hose off (the dust and dirt from Lattakia had given us a nice coating on the decks well spread by salt spray during the sail down.
We opted for a hire car for our exploring rather than the tour buses. First trip was north up the coast and then inland to Les Cedars. This is a cedar grove dating back 1500 years in the mountains and only a few k’s from a major ski resort – Lebanon used to have extensive cedar forests and the cedar tree features on their national flag. The cedar grove is 102 hectare’s and is surrounded by a high stone wall paid for by Queen Victoria in 1898 before her visit to Lebanon. From here we drove up through the ski resort, with the Swiss Alp style hotels and chalets, and across the mountain pass at 2,200 metres to then drop down into the Beqaa valley.
At Les Cedars - Jenny, Jim, Carola, Jim and Keith
The plan was to visit the World Heritage Site at Baalbeck which is in the Beqaa valley – and this area of Lebanon is home to the Shiite Muslim’s and the famous Hezbollah (means the Party of God) movement. Hezbollah have 14 seats in the Parliament and reportedly assist in many initiatives around housing, health and education in southern Lebanon. Further south in Israel they are still regarded as a terrorist movement though and they do seem to indulge is such activity from time to time according to Lonely Planet. They are reportedly financed by Iran with significant support from the Ayatollah. In the meantime Chris went off for a couple of days to photograph another World Heritage Site at Byblos, a coastal town not far north of Jounieh.
Pam at one of the Roman temples of Baalbeck.
The drive was characterised by our passage through numerous army check points fully manned with armed soldiers supported by a tank with a soldier in the gun turret with sand bags all around and camouflage above. We did get a sense of this the first night in Jounieh when we walked out of the marina main entrance to find a tank stationed at one end of the roundabout – tough way to control traffic!
Baalbeck is regarded as Lebanon’s greatest Roman treasure and construction on the site dates back to the 1st century BC however the buildings have been built and rebuilt over many years by different rulers. As a set of ruins they are certainly impressive and well worth the visit. The columns of marble are huge and of a size we have not seen before – very impressive! The underground tunnels built by the Roman’s house a wonderful museum with some great exhibits. Lebanon also has something of a reputation for wine making and as the grape growing area was quite close by we drove down to one of the better known wineries – Chateau Ksara, established in 1898 and complete with 2 k’s of tunnels for the cellars built by the Roman’s. Sampled a few of their wines (chardonnay, rose and merlot) and now have some on board in stock! All in all an enjoyable day and covered a few hundred k’s in company with Jim and Carola off Koza and their on board visitors Jim and Jenny from Brisbane.
This posting would not be complete without a mention of the driving style in Lebanon. Simply put it appears to be drive as fast as possible, overtake with freedom and hope that nothing is coming the other way and if it is simply pull in hoping to avoid cars going the same way. We were following the Jim’s and a van overtook us pulled in and then pulled out again to pass Jim – oncoming truck flashing lights so he pulled in to the right sideswiping Jim in the process and did not stop. The only way to avoid getting run off the road is to drive like they do – apart from the overtaking approach which seems to be based on the 50/50 rule. The state of the roads is bad (worse than Syria), largely with no lanes marked and this does not help the stress levels. Certainly a great place to drive if you want to test the nerves. Plenty of Mercedes and other expensive European cars around (without dents) certainly indicates that Beirut at least is significantly stronger economically that its neighbours. It is the banking centre for the Middle East and we understand the home to plenty of petro-dollars from Saudi Arabia.
Pam walking the walk on the Corniche, Beirut
Beirut is a stunning city located on the coast and known as the Paris of the Middle East. The city centre has been largely rebuilt with impressive buildings with many closed streets to support outdoor cafes and restaurants not to mention many very upmarket stores. We had dinner there one evening and watched Australia get annihilated by Germany in their World Cup opener – the Lebanese are certainly favouring Germany based on that evening and the number of German flags we see around. The city certainly has World Cup fever and the excitement and energy levels are very high. Our exit from the area was interesting in that our group of about 20 had arranged to meet at a certain point at 2230 hrs which we did. A group of armed soldiers appeared and casually seemed to arrange themselves so they were on either side of our group as we walked up the street to get the bus – basically they herded us out of the area. These guys were serious – left hand on the barrel, right hand on the trigger all the way, and we see them everywhere we go. We met a taxi driver who we commissioned to drive us around Beirut for a few hours (the plan to drive ourselves was abandoned) and it was interesting to get his perspective on a number of things. Despite 15 years of civil war between Christians and Muslims the different groups still live in different parts of the country and cities and the population is split about 50/50 – when we commented to the driver that Jounieh was a nice area his reply was that it was Christian.
Bombed out Holiday Inn, middle of Beirut - kept as a reminder
We drove down the street that was the demarcation line (the Green Line) between Christians and Muslim’s during the 15 years of civil war that only ended in 1990 although Syria did not withdraw from Lebanon until 2005 after 30 years of occupation. It was interesting to note that the street all the major banks are in was not damaged during the civil war and our guide said the banks had a bet both ways and made “donations” to each side. There are hundreds of thousands of Palestinian’s located in refugee tent camps in southern Lebanon and it seems almost inevitable that conflict between Israel and Hezbollah will flare up again – the Palestinian’s are a displaced people and it is hard to visualise peace in this region until the Palestinian issue is resolved and that is to a large degree is in the hands of the Israeli’s.
All in all Beirut is a large cosmopolitan city of huge contrast but the country is even more so – cities or towns like Baaleck and Tripoly are totally unlike Beirut, more reminiscent of Syrian towns and do not appear to have the underlying wealth evident in Beirut.
Several Turkish and other yachts , including our group leader Murat, have withdrawn from the rally in Syria in protest at Israel’s attack on the supply convey in which several Turks were killed. So the rally fleet is down by about four boats. But we have had word that the visit to Egypt is back on.
Cheers
Keith