Is that the longest day ever?

Day 1 in Beirut was an interesting one. It started at about 8am on a Wednesday, in Sydney. We woke up, had breakfast, and got ready for our flight that afternoon. We arrived at the airport around midday and had some time to check-in, have lunch (what a kebab…) and wait around for our 4pm flight.

Begrudgingly, we took off at about 4:15pm, headed on our 15hr flight to Doha. I’ll spare you the boring details of the flight.

We arrived in Doha at 11:30pm local time, and I was suitably tired, having only managed to sleep a couple of hours at the most. From there, we had a short rest, before boarding our flight to Beirut. Another 4 or 5 hours later, we finally arrived in Beirut, just as the sun was rising. I managed a couple more hours of half-sleep during this flight luckily.

We found our way to the hotel we’re staying in, which is quite a nice place, and had some much needed showers. Once refreshed, we headed out to begin our day in Beirut with some well-deserved traditional breakfast. Not to mention, the best orange juice I’ve ever had. Seriously, how was it so good?

The rest of the day was spent in downtown Beirut, which seems to be a more modern part of the city. There are a lot of shops and restaurants around, a lot of which reminds me of parts of Europe. Wide cobblestone streets, Parisian-looking buildings.

We also came across a large Mosque, which was closed unfortunately, but still got to see around it.

In the afternoon, we came across some markets which were being set up for later that evening (there was also a stage being set up for a concert of sorts). After perusing there, we sat down nearby to rest and have a drink. I opted for Mango juice this time. Wasn’t as good.

Our plan was to then head back to the apartment for a rest, before returning to the markets when it was in full swing with the music and all later that evening. Soon after we got back, we all wanted a quick nap. It was around 6pm at the point I went to sleep.

Turns out, I was really tired. I woke up at 6am the next morning, and it seems everyone else did basically the same. Except for dinner. I missed out on that (apparently they tried, but couldn’t wake me). No matter. It is now early morning, as I catch up on processing photos and writing this.

I’m eating my leftover dinner, cold, as I write. It’s still pretty good.