Damascus

With a population of 3.5 million inhabitants, Damascus is considered to be the oldest continually inhabited capital in the world. Lying between the Anti-Lebanon Mountains and the desert, it was one of the great caravan cities and religious centres of the Middle East.

Damascus consists of two parts – the central walled old city and the surrounding modern town. Not to be missed are the excellent National Museum with great archaeological finds from sites around Syria, the 18th century Azem Palace, Straight Street mentioned in the Old Testament, the Ananais Chapel where the apostle St. Paul was given shelter and one of Islam's most magnificent monuments – the Umayyad Mosque, completed in 715 AD. The Mosque stands on a site that has been held sacred for almost three thousand years, being successively used as a pagan temple, a Roman Temple of Jupiter, a Christian Basilica and finally a Mosque which contains the tomb of St. John the Baptist.

A visit to Damascus is never complete without a walk around the souks, with their exotic scents of spices and confectionary. A short distance from Damascus are the Christian villages of Seydnaya and Maaloula where the inhabitants still speak Aramaic, the language of Christ.