Mount Lebanon is the name of the mountain range that vertically bisects the country, as well as the name of a governorate region to the west of the range. A Lebanese claim to fame is being able to ski and tan at the beach in the same day, and in the winter months this is possible due to the drastic changes in altitude in such a small country. In the mountains live the last few stands of Lebanese Cedar trees, slow-growing evergreen conifers. The cedar tree is the emblem of Lebanon; it has deep roots in the cultural history of the country and features in the center of its flag. The Phoenicians used the wood for their ships, and Lebanese Cedar made it as far as Babylon and Egypt. We visited Al Shouf Cedar Nature Reserve, the largest nature reserve in the country, where trees as old as 2,000 years are protected, and new trees are planted.

Though the Mount Lebanon Governorate is mainly Christian, about a fifth of the population is Druze. The Druze are an obscure ethnoreligious group who tend to live in mountainous regions in the Levant. We drove through a Druze village on our way to Qasr Musa and Beiteddine Palace. Qasr Musa (Moussa Castle) is a structure built by one man over 60 years that’s one part fortress, one part art project, one part museum of unlabeled collected items, and three parts weird. Beiteddine Palace, built in the early 1800s, has some of the most intricate wood, stone, and tile work I have ever seen. It is currently the summer residence of the Lebanese president, and hosts a notable Art Festival each year as well.

Mount LEBANON GOVERNORATE

Crates, Lebanon divisions, Governorate name labels added by Danielle Raad, CC BY-SA 3.0