Hama and the Orontes Valley

Qala'at al-Kahd: The most remote, mystical, and magical of all the crusader castles in Syria.

Qasr Ibn Wardan: Byzantine ruins set in the most unlikely of places.

Aphamea: Perhaps the most spectacular Roman colonnaded street you will ever see, especially when caught in morning fog.

Hama: A relaxing and picturesque city on the Orontes River famous for its waterwheels.

Quick Tips:

During the summer months, this area of Syria probably gets the most tourists, thus you should make hotel reservations in Hama a few days in advance. Hama has a number of great budget hotels, incuding Cairo, Riyad, and Noria, but if you want luxury, there is also the five-star Aphamea Cham Palace.

Best Way To Get Around:

The best way to get around in my opinion is by rental car. There are Hertz and Europcar rental offices in Damascus, Homs, and Aleppo (as well as a few other cities), all at affordable rates. It is about /day for a Renault Clio, which is all you need. Driving in Syria really is not the mess you would think it is. The roads are actually in quite good shape and there is a lot of signage in English.

Other than a rental car, the best option is to arrange tours through your hotel in Hama. For about a day, you can see the major sights.

The Cairo Hotel is without a doubt one of the best budget options in all of Syria. Situated right in downtown Hama, you have the whole city available to you within walking distance. The entrance is an unremarkable staircase with a sign that says "Welcame to Cairo Hotel" (no, that is not a typo). Once at the top, you will be greeted by the friendly smile and "Marhaba" of the owner, whose name, despite numerous conversations, I never learned. Everyone at the hotel speaks enough English to help you in what you need, and in the case that you want to try out your Arabic, everyone is more than happy to help you out.

The Cairo Hotel is impeccably clean, offering double rooms with attached baths (western toilets, not Syrian) for around $10/night. Prices may go up and down a bit depending on the season, but you will never be paying more for the level of service you will receive. Upon arriving, you will most likely be greeted with tea, and any time of the day you may feel like sitting down for a glass of coffee or tea, there will always be someone there willing to offer you one free of charge. A typical Syrian breakfast (eggs, cheese, jam, bread, butter, olives, etc.) is also served in the mornings, although, if you are sick of the same old Syrian breakfast, I recommend you take a trip down to Ali Baba’s just 2 blocks away, where you can enjoy the best falafel or fetteh in Syria for about $0.50. Fetteh is a dish of sliced pita with clarified butter, yogurt, and hummos poured on top of it, along with a bit of lemon. Eat one of those in the morning and you will be good to go all the way until dinner.

The Cairo Hotel also has one computer for Internet (albeit a bit slow), but what really makes the place a hit with travelers is the great and affordable tours they offer. The owner will undoubtedly inform you of the 15 or so trips that they offer, and in case you don’t find something you like there, they will happily organize a special trip just for you. Prices all depend on the number of people going, but the most you will be paying for day-long trips to about three sights is $20.

The only real complaint I have about the hotel is that the hallways and rooms are not well-insulated, so if people are out in the hall at night or in the morning, it can get loud, but other than that, I was happy on each of the four separate occasions I stayed there. However, because the hotel is quite popular with tourists, in the high season you should always call ahead. If it is full, though, don’t despair, for you can stop by the Riyad Hotel next door and ask Muhammad if he has any rooms. The quality, prices, and friendliness are just as good.

Out of the 15 or so Crusader Castles that I have visited while in Syria, none of them can compare to Qaalar al-Kahf (Castle of the Cave) when it comes to sheer natural magnificence. Set perched atop a tree-covered promontory, the ruins of the castle keep watch over the surrounding valley and bring to mind images of castles from Lord of the Rings or some other fantasy masterpiece. Approaching the castle by road, it is easy to see why the mysterious assassin sect decided to build one of their strongholds on this exact site.
Even today, the castle is in the literal middle of nowhere. Besides the obviously new road that approaches that dead-ends at the castle, there is not another road or house in sight, and the only sounds that drift down the valley are those of the wind and the occasional flock of birds. Despite having my own car and a guidebook, it took me a little over 45 minutes, making numerous stops to ask directions, and a bit of luck to find the castle. I can only imagine what it was like in the 1100s, when the armies of Saladin searched all around the Jebel Ansariye for the castle. If you do not speak Arabic, the only way to get to the castle is probably to hire a taxi in the nearby town of Ash-Sheikh Badr, because otherwise, you will be driving around, trying to follow signs that are only in Arabic, and you will be in the most remote parts of the mountains, where an English or French speaker is about as common as someone who speaks Japanese. A taxi from Ash-Sheikh Badr would cost around $20, but the trip is more than worth it.

While the castle itself is in an advanced state of ruin, thanks to an overzealous British woman who persuaded the Ottoman army to destroy it, still the spectacular scenery and the fact that you will most certainly be the only one there is enough to make up for the mediocre and overgrown ruins. The approach to the castle is the best-preserved part. The path leads you by the old baths, which are still in great shape with all the intricate stone work and even the terracotta pipes present. From the baths, you then approach the entranceway, carved out of the face of the cliff with an Arabic inscription on the lintel. After going through the cave-like entrance, you climb up the stairs and into the keep of the castle. Here, there is not too much left, but the views are unbeatable. The green mountains of the Jebel Ansariye are spread out before you, and with a little imagination, you might be able to imagine the castle as a towering fortress containing the most feared man of the Crusader-era, Rashid ud-Din Sinan.

One thing I only wish I had time to go back and do is spend a night camping on the mountain. That, I imagine, would be an unbeatable experience.

When you first arrive at Qasr Ibn Wardan, two questions invariably enter your mind. The first is, "Who the heck would build a fortress in such a godforsaken place?" and the second is, "Where in the world is the gatekeeper?" The first question really is a bit of mystery, and you will have plenty of time to ponder it while walking along the outside of the ruins waiting for the gatekeeper to pop out of his house nearby and pull up in his red pick-up. Even though the ruins are no more than 30 minutes from the lush plains around Hama, this Byzantine fortification is built along a stretch of complete desert. It really is a wonder just how a Byzantine outpost could have survived here, but as you can tell by the size of the ruins, they not only survived but thrived.

There are two main complexes that remain today. The smaller, yet architecturally more interesting, of the two is a Byzantine church containing a beautiful lintel engraved with Greek, along with some lovely marble columns that contrast starkly with the red-and-brown bricks of the walls. Next to the church is a larger building that was once a palace. The most impressive part of the palace is the large central courtyard with a series of rooms extending out from the side, the most interesting of which is a long, narrow hallway not even big enough for my shoulders that ends in what is presumably the royal water closet. Also from the courtyard you clan climb a set of stairs to get up to the second floor, where you will find the best views of the surrounding desert. From here you can see how the Byzantines would have found this spot helpful in their constant efforts to exert control over the Bedouins of the surrounding desert. Across from the palace and the church you will find the one tower that remains of the barracks, and usually it is surrounded by a flock of sheep grazing on the small blades of grass poking out of the ground.

The gatekeeper is a friendly local who lives in a nearby house and opens the gates for visitors when he is not tending to his sheep. He speaks no English whatsoever, so unless you speak Arabic, he won’t be able to give any sort of tour around the ruins, but he will still greet you with the same friendliness so typical of Syria.

Getting to and from Qasr Ibn Wardan is incredibly easy by your own car or by hiring one in Hama. If you come on your own or with a hired car, though, and you have another hour or two to spare, make sure you continue on to the never-visited ruins of Andarin. You won’t be disappointed.

It was about 2pm. My girlfriend and I were sitting outside of the ruins of Qasr Ibn Wardan, wondering what to do next. We still had over 2 hours until the sun set and we didn’t want to head back to Hama yet, so we opened up the guide book in search of something else nearby to see because, well, this is Syria and there is always something else nearby to see. Finally we noticed an entry on the ruins of Al-Andarin, which were only 25km away. It was an old Byzantine settlement that sounded interesting, but the guidebook was less than impressed. It read, "Very little remains today other than the jumbled ruins of the barracks and one church. Unless you have a special interest it is perhaps not worth the extra time involved in visiting." It sounded ominous, but we decided to give it a shot anyway. If it was a dud, oh well.

So we headed off to Al-Andarin, farther into the desert and past a number of the famous beehive houses native to the region. All along the way the signage was good and eventually we arrived at a sign in a small town that took us off the main road and said, "al-Andarin 5km" (in Arabic only, of course). The road was no longer paved and was just a dirt track, which was fine, but then all of a sudden the track crested a hill to reveal a completely open plain below. It was here that the track split into about four different paths, all looking perfectly valid. We had only gone 1km, so we knew that we had 4km left. Unsure of what to do, we gazed out over the plain.

"Those could be ruins over there…"

"No they look too modern. How about over there?"

"Let’s go for it."

So, with no real idea of where we were going, we hopped back into the car and chose one of the paths. We descended into the plain, and after another 3km, we still had no sign of ruins and we had arrived at a crossroads. Right or left - and us with no clue. After a few minutes of staring off into the distance, a Syrian came petering by on a motorbike. I waved for him to stop and asked him about the ruins. He smiled, pointed me in the right direction, and asked me if we were archaeologists. "No, just tourists," I replied. He was puzzled.

His directions proved true, though, and we arrived at the ruins to find not only 3 square km of ruins, but also a newly paved road that leads right back to the main road. It was soon obvious that the guidebook seriously underestimated al-Andarin in that even though most of the ruins are quite ruined, the barracks, church, and bathhouse that remain are beautiful, and I found al-Andarin to be one of the most atmospheric places in all of Syria. Just goes to show that you can’t always trust guidebooks.

There is really no other way to say it, Syria is overflowing with Crusader castles. In the coastal mountains and in the area around Hamah, they are literally every 50km. Seeing all of the castles that exist in Syria is an endeavor that could easily take the better part of a year. I have been in Syria for nearly 6 months, and I still haven’t seen all of the castles that this wonderful country has to offer, and it is not like I didn’t try. Most likely, if you are the casual visitor to Syria, you will have 2 weeks or so to see the major sights of Syria, and thus some of the great castles, like Qalaat al-Kahf or Qalaat Abou Qoubeis, will fall by the wayside. It is inevitable. It is, I suppose, the curse that Syria bears for being one of the cradles of civilization--its sights are so numerous that one could spend years seeing them, but most tourists have no more than 2 weeks, and therefore the lesser monuments, the monuments that, if they existed in almost any other country would be counted as tourism gems, remain hidden and unseen by the eyes of the casual visitor. However, in that rare case where a tourist has more than 2 weeks, a month perhaps, to tour this treasury of archeological gold, that tourist has the chance discover that these lesser sights are by no means “lesser.” They have plenty to give, but when put against the weight of Krak des Chavaliers or Palmyra, they stand no chance. Qalaat Abou Qoubeis is one of these places. It is a place that I would never tell the casual visitor that he must see, but it is a place that, if you have the time, can provide you with a magical experience.

Of all the castles in the Hama region, Abou Qoubeis probably provides you with the best views of the Orontes Valley and the fertile al-Ghab plains, provided that they are not covered in fog. It is located high above a small village of the same name, on the edge of the Jebel Ansariye. The town itself is actually quite nice, with a few small waterfalls and some old churches that are worth a look. The castle itself is not the best preserved in Syria. There is no noticeable entrance, and don’t expect anyone to come and collect money from you. Instead, Abou Qoubeis sits on its perch alone, and it is you who has to scramble up the rocks to reach it. Once you find the one crack in the wall that lets you into the castle, you will find various rooms, towers, and piles of rocks to climb on to get the best views. There no one thing that makes the castle outstanding, but the combination of its isolation, the view, and the chance to sit atop its walls, stare out across the valley, and just have a minute to yourself makes the castle worth it.

Aphamea is one of the most visited sights in Syria along with Krak Des Chavaliers and Palmyra, and for good reason. Its 2km long colonnaded street is one of the most singularly spectacular Roman monuments in the world. More intact and better restored than similar streets of such sights as Ephesus, Jerash, and Palmyra, it is a must-see for all visitors to Syria. Unfortunately, because of its popularity, it suffers all the ills of a major sight. Tour buses pile up in the parking lot, unloading group after group of Italian and French tourists and their guides, but perhaps more annoying are the local touts who buzz through the ruins on their motorbikes calling to each "Monsieur" or "Madame" they see with the hope of unloading some "antiques" or "Roman" coins. However, if you time it just right and have a just a bit of luck, you can find the ruins hidden deep in a thick layer of morning fog and have almost the whole place to yourself.

The great thing about the ruins is that, since they are not gated, you can show up whenever you want. The ticket office doesn’t open until 8am, and if you arrive before then, the ticket man will track you down sooner or later, so there is nothing to worry about. The way to do Aphamea is certainly to get there as early as possible. It is no more than 45 minutes from Hama, so arriving around 8am is not to tall of a task. The advantage of doing this is that you will miss most of the crowds and the touts (all late-risers), and even more spectacularly, you have the chance of catching the ruins hidden in the morning fog typical of the al-Ghab plains. The ruins themselves really don’t need much help in making themselves any more spectacular, but when the fog rolls in and covers the ugly houses in the distance, you can stroll along the colonnaded street unbothered, listening perhaps to the soft hum of a water pump nearby with each new section of columns popping out of the fog to greet you.

It is in a time like this that you can really let yourself go and imagine this town like it might have been at its height, a busting center of trade and culture. All along the street you can see evidence of the stores that used to line the sides, a street full of markets and shops, the forefather to the great souks of Damascus and Aleppo. In fact, looking at the set-up of the now empty shops hidden among the columns, it is easy to see the relation to the old cities of Damascus and Aleppo.

The colonnaded street is no doubt the highlight of Aphamea and that is all most tourists see, but any visitor must make the 10-minute walk to see the ruined roman villa with its spectacular courtyard. Other than the villas of Pompeii, this is the best I have seen.

Without a doubt, Husn Suleyman is the hardest site to find in all of Syria. The ruins are hidden deep in the Jebel Ansariye amidst a maze of narrow roads that snake through the mountains, destroying any sense of direction that you may still have. The maps we had were hopeless, and even though the guidebook had directions, we had to be cheeky and come from a completely different direction, rendering the guidebook useless. The one saving grace was that Syria loves to put up road signs, even if they often are just in Arabic. The major problem, though, is that sometimes when you are at an intersection of three roads, the direction the sign is pointing isn’t always clear. Thus, mainly by a lot of luck and a few stops for directions, about an hour and half after leaving Hama, we arrived at Husn Suleyman. It may not have been the most direct route, but nothing in Syria ever is.

Husn Suleyman is another one of the sights in Syria that fantastically displays its ancient past. First built as a Canaanite temple in the 4th century BC, Husn Suleyman then became a Phoenician center of worship. Before long it passed into the hands of the Romans, when the dedication of the temple switched from Baal to Jupiter and it remained so long after the region became heavily Christianized.

As you approach the temple, nestled in the center of a small villiage, from the hills above, it doesn’t look so spectacular, but once you park you car at the entrance and see the sheer size of the rocks forming the outer walls, all doubt dissipates. The rocks, larger than Volkswagens, are absolutely gigantic. When you consider the location of the temple, high up in the Jebel Ansariye, the rocks seem even more impressive as you try and imagine just how they managed to move these rocks around.

The entrance contains a nicely decorated lintel and two small alcoves on either side that presumably held statues. Once through the entrance, you are confronted with the enormous cella or inner-chamber of the temple with its long staircase leading up to what is now a few towering pillars and a pile of rocks. It is not hard to imagine, though, just how enormous the structure was 2,000 years ago. From the top of the cella, you get some good views of the surrounding mountains, although the view is destroyed a bit by the surrounding houses and villages. Much of this area exists mainly as a summer retreat for Syrians who escape to the mountains to enjoy the cooler air, but during the winter, the towns are all but empty. Thus, if you visit during the winter, you will no doubt be alone like I was, although due to the remoteness of the site, it is hard to imagine that it gets too crowded in summer either.

Across from the main temple complex is a small secondary temple, but not much remains besides the walls.

Hama is a constant favorite with travelers in Syria for its central location, great budget hotel options, and picturesque location along the Orontes River. It is a city that was once one of the most beautiful in all of Syria, with riverside gardens, a bustling old city, and its famous waterwheels (or norias). However, a violent uprising by the Muslim Brotherhood in 1982 against the secular Alawi regime of Hafez al-Assad spurred the government to brutally repress the rebellion before it spread to other parts of Syria. The result was an almost complete destruction of the old city of Hama due to fighting and bombing and the deaths of an estimated 20,000 people. Today, the residents of Hama don’t like to talk about the events both because of a fear the government and because, surprisingly, many people are happy to see the Muslim Brotherhood gone. Even despite the events of 1982, Hama has much of its former charm, with large expanses riverside gardens and cafés that allow you to get great views of the norias and aqueducts that ruled this city hundreds of years ago.

To explore Hama itself, you really need only 1 day. The sights aren’t that plentiful that it should warrant much more than that, but if you are traveling in Syria and want to see a good number of the sights in the mountains, then you will probably end up spending a few nights here, as it is the best city in the region to arrange day trips to such sites as Krak des Chavaliers, Misyaf, and Aphamea, as well as countless others.

The time to visit Hama is certainly in the late spring or early fall, when the weather is sunny and warm so you can take full advantage of restaurants, such as Sultan, with outdoor terraces situated along the water, where you can eat and watch the ceaseless churning of the mighty norias nearby. However, this is also Hama at its most crowded and many of the good hotels, such as Cairo or Riyad, may be booked. In the winter, the weather isn’t warm enough to sit outside, but it is still pleasant, and many of the restaurants and cafés still have indoor seating that offer great views.

In terms of sights, the most obviously Hama-specific sights are the norias, the towering waterwheels dating back to the Mamluke era that were used to dump water onto large aqueducts that would carry the water into the farmlands. Today, there are a good 14 or so left along the Orontes, with about 6 right in the center of Hama. Beyond the waterwheels, however, there are also the wonderful, and recently built, Hama Museum and the Azam Palace museum, which give interesting glimpses into Syria’s past. You may want to stop by and see the traditional goat hair weavers near al-Aubaysi Mosque as well. Other than that, the only thing left to do is get the best falafel in all of Syria from Ali Baba’s on Kouwalti Street.

In the time of the Crusades, there was one name that could strike fear into both Crusader and Muslim alike, and that was the Assassins, the name of the radical Ismaili sect that had moved into Syria from Persia in the early 12th century, taking advantage of its fragmented state to establish a strong foothold in the Ansariye Mountains. The Assassins, the name supposedly being a corruption of the Arabic hashisheen, meaning "those who use hashish," was so powerful that it passed into the European lexicon with its present meaning. Even during the time of the Crusades, not much was known about this sect and its leader, Rashid ud-Din Sinan, the Old Man in the Mountain. Instead, various rumors arose about their drug use, their sexual exploits, and the fanatical devotion of the Assassins to their leader. For almost 200 years, however, this sect terrorized both the Crusader and Muslim armies during the Crusades with its constant killing of Crusader and Muslim leaders. For those two centuries, they were one of the most powerful entities in Syria and the castle of Misyaf was their base.

Today, if you are lucky enough to come to Misyaf on one of the misty mornings so famous to the Ghab plains around Hama, then you will see just why the Assassins and their stronghold struck so much fear into the hearts of men that even Saladin himself couldn’t bear to attack the fortress. It is perched majestically on top of hill at the foot of the Jebel Ansariye, and when you catch it rising out of the morning mist, it is a castle worthy of Lord of the Rings or some other fantasy epic. The castle is surprisingly well-preserved, and walking around the castle, even though you can see the remains of Roman and Byzantine columns and capitals integrated into the walls, you still can get a feel for the traditional Ismaili architecture of the castle through its irregular stone work. Although the castle itself is not the equal of Krak des Chavaliers or some of the other Crusader castles in the region, the views atop castle of the al-Ghab plains to the east and the Jebel Ansariye to the west are spectacular. The only disappointment is that a rather large town has built up around the castle, spoiling the view a bit.

For some reason, this castle is not often visited by travelers, and if you get lucky like I did, you will be the only person in the whole castle, and when that happens, it is a magical place. Also, don’t forget to take advantage of a unique experience that the few who visit Misyaf miss, tea and argileh (hookah) in a cave. If you follow the path around the castle, you will find a series of caves in the rock. Nearby is a small hut; bang on the door and they’ll set you up with an argileh and tea in the cave, a wonderful experience.