Besides the Beirut Museum, the Jeitta Grotto was an unexpected highlight of our trip. It might have been one of those times when you come into a situation with absolutely no expectations, but I think even if someone had told us the grotto was going to be cool, we’d still end up being pleasantly surprised. We hired a driver to take us there, he dropped us off and pointed us in the direction of this cable car:
And that is the end of any photos I have from Jeitta, because they were extraordinarily militant about taking our cameras away. I’m not sure why they care if we take pictures of a bloody cave, but perhaps they just didn’t want flashes going off all the time inside.
The only way I can describe the Jeitta Grotto to you is to imagine if nature designed a grand Catholic Cathedral. It is part of a cave system that is more than 5.6 miles long. The first cave we visited was absolutely huge- 120 meters/390 feet tall, and the upper vault was 57 meters wide. There were enormous stalacties and stalagmites everywhere, including a clump of stalactites and stalagmites known as “the mushroom” which was 26m high and about as wide as semi truck is long. The upper grotto has terraced pools where the water was super still and eerily clear. The operators had done a great job building a non-obtrusive walking that snakes its way through and up the cave, and all around you can hear drip, drip, drip constantly. The size of this place is incredible considering that stalactites and -mites only grow 1/4 inch PER CENTURY.
Next we went to the lower grotto, which had a pretty large crystal clear lake! We got in a small, flat-bottomed boat and got a private drive through the lake to look around. At some points the ceiling was so low we had to duck our heads to get through. It was cool yet humid inside.
A few other Lebanon highlights I’d rather not forget–
On our drive, we saw a series of terrible billboards. One said, “Go shopping! It’s cheaper than a psychiatrist! (Money Makes the Difference)” and the other said “She got her good looks from her father…he’s a plastic surgeon! (Money Makes the Difference).” I’m not sure what exactly what was being advertised but it sounds expensive.
Our cab driver on our museum-Jeitta-Byblos trip must have had a rough night, because every time we came back to the car we found him with his head stuffed between the driver’s side window and steering wheel fast asleep.
In Byblos, while Severin was attempting to buy tickets to the crusader castle, a man pushed around him trying to pass something to the window. He obviously knew we were miffed at his invasion of our personal space, because he looked at us and said, “Don’t worry! I work here!” He asked us where he was from, to which we said America, and he replied, “Alright! Hollywood! Cupertino, California!” Apple has made little Cupertino world-famous 😀
We were in bumper-to-bumper traffic in downtown Beirut, and our cab driver was having a full-on conversation through rolled-down windows with another older man, who had the dopest pasha mustache we have ever seen. It was super full and perfectly curled and twirled. The cab driver didn’t speak a lick of English and just kept saying “Good Baba? Ok Baba?” to Severin.