Syria

The old Roman town of Palmyra, well known for it's colonnaded streets. This is probably the most famous tourist site in Syria, aside from Damascus and Aleppo.

Gentlemen enjoying shisha at Damascus' oldest cafe, at the Damascus souq. Damascus claims to be the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world. Aleppo down the road also makes the same claim. Shisha is also known as the hookah, water pipe or hubble bubble. There are little embers of coal in the top container, with a block of scented tobacco lain on top. Apple is a popular flavour. Then the gent pulls on the pipe which draws the air down through water. A cafe will supply you with a packaged filter. On a tour everyone is keen to try it, probably because they are hoping it is marijuana, and this is no doubt a leading cause of the colds which sweep through every tour.

You can barely make out Pammie kneeling in the middle of the front row. We saw signs to Baghdad all along the trip so this is no indication that we were very close, still, it is the nearest city to where we were. We stopped here just after visiting the Baghdad Cafe, which is not in Baghdad and does not offer cafe service, but it has been in a movie I think.