Submitted by scott on

September 12 Thursday

The group broke camp at 6:30 AM.  and traveled to Temnin el  Foka.  From Sam’s notebook:1867 "Passed up the Valley & camped on l. side under the dews of Hermon. –first passing through a dirty Arab village & visiting the tomb of Noah, of Deluge notoriety.

We are camped near Temnin-el-Foka—a name which the boys have simplified a good deal, for the sake of convenience in spelling. They call it Jacksonville. It sounds a little strangely, here in the Valley of Lebanon, but it has the merit of being easier to remember than the Arabic name.

This portion of the journey would be approximately 16.4 miles.  Temnin el Foka has an elevation of 3,517 fee, not likely to provide a vista of valleys and the sea.

The Next Morning:  The pilgrims then re-joined the Beirut to Aleppo track, an old feeder route into the Silk Road souk town of Aleppo. Mark Twain noted with some surprise that “all the Syrian world seemed to be under way also. The road was filled with mule trains and long processions of camels.”  The pilgrims traveled to Baalbek.

Murray's Route 38 covers the road from Ba'albek to Beyrout, this includes the leg from Mekseh to Zahleh and from there to Ba'albek.

 

Syrians Under Ottoman Rule

If ever an oppressed race existed, it is this one we see fettered around us under the inhuman tyranny of the Ottoman Empire. I wish Europe would let Russia annihilate Turkey a little—not much, but enough to make it difficult to find the place again without a divining-rod or a diving-bell. The Syrians are very poor, and yet they are ground down by a system of taxation that would drive any other nation frantic.

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