Ahhhh....nature.....

It was a perfect time to get away from the hot city and go explore a nearby nature reserve with an ACS tour guide. This trip was to the Al Shouf Cedar Reserve to see the famous cedars of Lebanon. Our incredible tour guide, Andre, is the outdoor recreation teacher at the school.  He lives in a valley near the reserve so he took us on a little hike to show us around and give us a taste of what the kids get to be out in during the rec classes.

First stop was breakfast.  On the way up to the nature preserve we stopped for breakfast at a total hole-in-the-wall place in a town way up in the mountains.  Thank goodness for our tour guide who did all the ordering for us!  He got us manakish (the pita bread) with cheese and also one with za'atar.  Za'atar is the spread on the bread.  It is made up of olive oil, sesame seeds, oregano, thyme and salt.  It's exact ingredients vary from area to area- every town thinks their za'atar is the best.  The drink in the pictures is a salty yogurt drink called Ayran.  Not really something I could get down but I could see it being really refreshing in this heat (if you weren't me).  Ryan seemed to like it.

And on to the forest.  Up and up we went until I didn't think that we could go any higher and then we were there.  It's on the slopes of the Barouk mountain and takes up over 550 square kilometers (about 350 square miles?)  The elevation is about 6,375 feet (1,943 meters) so it's pretty high up!  We first walked around a little well marked trail to tell us all about the animals up there.  Wish we would have seen a wild boar, a caracal or an ibex but I just saw a whole bunch of skinks and some pheasants.   

Andre, explaining the history of the forest and all about the cedars life cycle.

Then we started to go off trail.  Andre knew this hike like the back of his very tan hand.  Ryan had the camera so be prepared for goofy me pictures.

Pictures of the cedars on the way up.  Notice the way the cones grow on the top of the trees here unlike the Washington cedars that have them growing throughout and underneath.

 

Me and our British friend, Nicola. Her husband teaches at the American University and she teaches at the American Community school like Ryan.

I had to see if they smelled like cedars I'm used to.  Close, but a little more lemony.

We found a snake in this old tree but it slithered away before we could take a picture.  Here is Nicola again, looking cute in her hat.

 At some point in the 70's there was some replanting of the cedars and they planted them in rows.  This apparently was a bad idea because a cedar needs the shade of another cedar to grow well.  So they tried planting by helicopter and planting in clusters and the trees grew much happier.

 Shade!  Actually, it was a ton cooler up here than I thought it would be.  Cute picture of us looking extra happy.

 A picture of new cones.  They start out like this all light green and sappy and then when the times comes they apparently explode all their little seeds that have feathery wings (a bit like those helicopter seeds that Maples drop) and they float to the ground.

 A man made reservoir we came across.  Notice it's all roped off- to the left there is another reservoir that was created just for the animals to drink from.

 After the hike we headed to a beautiful town down the hill from us called Deir El Qamar meaning "monastery of the moon".  If you get the chance, look it up on Wikipedia.  It has a really interesting history and way better pictures than I can take!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_el_Qamar

We ate a traditional mezze lunch right across from a mosque and a wax museum.

Inside the restaurant- a meeting area? Me with our tour guide.

We knew that taking a picture of the napkin would be the only way we'd remember the name of the city!  Fruit is served at the end of every meal. A fellow teacher, Tom, poses with our dessert.

This is where things got fuzzy.  Between our tour guides thick French accent and his Lebanese accent we totally misunderstood what building we were in.  Both Ryan and I understood that it was the home of a prince but couldn't find a darn thing about it on the internet.

Really cool puzzle tiles in the archway.

This is arabic writing around a room that says things for the prince like, "you are wonderful", "you will be amazing", etc.

Then back on the nice air conditioned bus to the school's recreation center.  They do biology lessons, camp outs and even service projects out here.  It looked like I imagine Africa to be like.  I somehow didn't take any pictures of the building itself but it was a really newly built stone building with tons of room for equipment, a huge picnic area, a campfire, and great bathrooms with showers.

This is Ryan saying, "we love Lebanon thisssss much!" :-)

 

It all feels like a vacation.

This past Monday we took an excursion to a resort called the Batroun Village Club (http://www.batrounvclub.com/) that is located about an north of Beirut.  The deputy headmaster of the school, David Warren, and his wife, Daisy, are members of the club and got us in at a discount.  It's a little bit up in the mountains and you wouldn't believe what a difference in temperature that makes!

Here's a map showing you where the resort is located. We live in downtown Beirut on that little peninsula that juts out.

The view of the pool from the reception desk.

The club is beautiful. It's a hotel (check out the caves you can stay in), fitness center, summer camp, pool, restaurant and also has horseback riding and tennis courts!  We immediately headed for the pool. 

Why am I wearing a goofy skull cap?  Your guess is as good as mine.  When some of the people in our party got in the water, the lifeguard promptly came over and told them they had to cover their hair when in the water.  So I had to go buy a slightly pointless swim cap (it was made out of nylon and didn't even keep the water from getting to my hair).  As a group we concluded that it wasn't about being modest since women were still wearing skimpy bikini's with the caps on. Plus, you could take them off as soon as you got out of the pool.  I think it's for filtration purposes.  They don't want a ton of hair clogging up things so they make you shed less by wearing these.  

I felt like I was in a synchronized swimming event so I tried my best to put on a show.  Thank goodness Ryan snapped this picture and not the one where I was dancing around holding my foot in the air.

Our friends, Joe Feia and Nicola Bright.   

Ryan didn't want me feeling left out so he grabbed a head thing too and put it on.  Don't we make a cute matching couple?

More of the group we went with: Lucy, Carolyn, Joe, Nicola and me.

Bill and Andrew in deep discussion...

Ryan and Andrew

Bill and Andrew

Bill shamelessly showing off his abs.  Whoa.

I wish I had been smart enough to take pictures of the rest of the day. David and Daisy who hosted this, treated our whole group to a buffet at the restaurant there. Seriously amazing food. All you can eat traditional Lebanese mezze food plus a sushi bar, dessert station and even a hot food buffet with this to-die-for cinnamon-y lamb and rice dish.  They were too good to us! Thank goodness after all that food I knew we were going on a hike the next day to burn it off!

Settling in

We are just settling in and trying to figure out what goes where and how we are ever going to fill all this space.  This might be the largest place I've ever lived in not counting my parents house or the dorms!  I thought I'd show you a few pictures of "home" so you can get a better idea of where we are.

These are pictures of the outside of our place. This is the front door and is super heavy and impossible to get into when you are carrying a bunch of groceries.

We have three balconies and this is a picture of the one that our bedroom and guest bedroom shares. We are the one between the two awnings. We found lawn chairs and now chill on our porch in the evening and watch the construction of a huge skyscraper in our front yard.

Where do I live you might ask? I have no clue because Beirut doesn't have an address system. You quite literally tell people where you live by telling what you live by. I know that the school calls my building Nazarian. Whether that is their nickname or the real name, I have no clue.  This is off another balcony overlooking the back courtyard of the building.

Now for the inside. We have two huge bedrooms and two bathrooms, a living room, entry, kitchen, and formal dining room. This is the guest room where you will be staying when you come.

The balcony off of the guest room and our master bedroom.

The view of an incredibly old building in Beirut out of our guest room window.

Bathroom #1 with a bidet! The ceilings are incredibly low in both of the bathrooms because there are storage units above each of them. When I shampoo my hair I scrape my hands on the ceiling.

The living room needs some decorators TLC.  We are going to a housewares store tomorrow so hopefully we'll see some things to spruce it up with.

Our tiny little kitchen with gas stove. The sink is so huge that I could get away with not washing my dishes for weeks!

The dining room is a total mess still but you get a little bit of an idea of how large it is. There is a table that seats eight and then another balcony off of it.

More pictures will come once we decorate!