Crossing the borders
Crossing the borders
I was always wondering how many goods pass illegally from Lebanon, until I finally went to Serghaya; a small town near the Syrian Lebanese borders.
When first we arrived it looked like a virgin valley to me; a lovely river passes through farms, villagers that smile while waving there hands, apricot and cherry trees all around. In conclusion, it was a perfect place to hike!
That's how the day began; we decided to head to a fountain called AlJosha, and the only thing that we had to do is following the old railway that was built in the last years when the Ottomans controlled the country.
We went there, and it was like magic, do you know how the scenes were? If you know Ein Al Khadra and Al FeeJ, it's exactly like this but without restaurants or pollution. The river's water is very pure and the even the farmers were nice.
We kept on going and going, and suddenly we heard a gunfire, the leader of the group (Bishr Sawwaf), asked us to hide our cameras and stop singing and making loud sounds (As we always do, we ruin the calmness of every place we hike in.). we came closer and closer to the sound till we figure out that it was a military officer hunting,
I donno if our ancestors left us a thing to hunt, I thought everything was already hunted by them, they left us only rabbits and frogs!
We asked him the way to Josha spring:
-Go further he said
so we did, we walked another hour till we reached a tent, beautiful teenage girls were working under it..
-escuse me ladys
(the ladys looked like guys actually)
-yea.. (with a thick and loud sound)
-can you tell me where am I?
-You're in Lebanon
dah you're kidding! We passed through the borders and nobody even asked us who we are and what we're doing! And there was no signs no anything, we just passed, and hola: we're in Lebanon…
we came back to Syria after walking back for about 30minutes, haha, and we had a great time.
Actually for me, this one was a picnic more than a hiking trip.
Enjoy the photos!