The Roman Ruins of Palmyra

Columns and an early morning may cause cold feet… Coming from Aleppo and making stops in Dair az-Zaur region to see the refugee camps with my own eyes, I went on to Syria’s most well-known attraction Palmyra (تدمر). On a very adventurous ride not only the driver’s hands clung to the car’s interior. Commenting everything with phrases like: is crazy, is very crazy, is very nice or is very old the ride was entertaining though, at least regarding the driver’s vocabulary :-)

About a half hour before sunset we arrived at Tadmur, the oasis next to the ruins of Palmyra. I immediately went to the Arabian fortress above the remainings of former Roman regional chief city to take advantage for the sunset light. The castle rock is about 4-5km away from Tadmur and offers a nice vista on the ruin site. Knowing this many bargainer might flock to you. It didn’t take much time and the first coach appear to spit out the first load of tourists. You won’t find a quiet moment up there as all of your separation attempts will quickly become copied. It’s a nice place though to experience a moderate desert sunset.

I went to bed early as I wanted to go to the ruin site in the early morning hours to benefit from sunrise light and its atmosphere. Tadmur doesn’t provide a lot of culinary surprises; also you won’t miss much when spending even the early evening hours trying to fall asleep. In the night there has already been quite a storm, about wind force 7-8; it’s cold air was cleary perceptible. Seeing your own breath is a definite indicator that’s it’s not tropically warm around you.

The first warm sunbeams were blocked by a huge cloud. My plan to catch early morning’s sidelight stranded. I had to spend about 45 minutes in a place sheltered from the cold wind as the fire planet didn’t win the fight against the clouds yet. It’s been worth the waiting though as more and more the sunbeams cut their way through the sky to make it appear like a gradient of light rose to dark navy blue.