Baalbek before lunch. The grotto after.
Which day trip really reaches the Bekaa and is back for dinner. Whether the road above Bcharre is open in March. Reviews of every tour you can book in Lebanon.
Baalbek, Jeita, Tyre, the Cedars: four days out of Beirut.
A first week in Lebanon is really four drives out of the city and back again. What each one costs, and what the people who took it say.
01The Bekaa dayGuided Small-Group Tour to Baalbek, Anjar and Ksara with LunchRoman Baalbek, the Umayyad town at Anjar and a Ksara cellar, over the pass and back in a day.
02The north dayGuided Small-Group Tour to Jeita, Harissa, Byblos with LunchThe grotto under the mountain, the hill above Jounieh and the harbour at Byblos, all before evening.
03The south daySmall-Group Adventure Tour to Sidon Tyre & Maghdouche-Day TripThe sea castle at Sidon, the Roman road through Tyre, and the shrine on the cliff at Maghdouche.
04The mountain dayGuided Small-Group Tour to Qadisha, Bcharee & Cedars with LunchUp the Qadisha gorge to Bcharre and the old cedar grove above it. The long one, and the one people describe first.
North, east or south. Pick the direction and the day writes itself.
Nearly every tour in this country leaves the city in the morning and is back for dinner. Three directions, what it costs to ride each one, and what is actually at the far end.
Beirut is two hours from almost everything Lebanon is famous for.
North to the river cave and the harbour town, east over the pass into the Bekaa, south along the coast to the Phoenician ports, and up the Qadisha to the last of the cedars.
Byblos has been a working harbour for seven thousand years.
Everything at Byblos →
A crusader castle sitting on a Phoenician port, a stone lane of restaurants behind it, and the fishing boats still tied up below. Most people reach it on the same north loop that takes in Jeita and Harissa.
Jeita, upper and lower galleries
A boat along an underground river in the lower gallery, a walkway among the stalactites above it. Cameras are taken off you at the door, which is the only complaint anyone makes.
The cable car to Our Lady of Lebanon
The téléphérique lifts out of Jounieh to the white statue on the ridge. The view back down the bay is the point, so take it before the afternoon haze settles in.
The old port and the castle above it
The castle, the Phoenician layers behind it and the souk lane running down to the water. The cobbles are original and they are not kind to a heel.
The days out more travellers book than anything else in Lebanon.
Every Lebanese tour we have reviewed →The tours that carry the most people in the country, and what earns each of them the slot.
1
Guided Small-Group Tour to Baalbek, Anjar and Ksara with Lunch
Spend about nine hours traveling from Beirut into the Bekaa Valley, with stops at Baalbek’s Roman temples, the Umayyad ruins at Anjar, and Chateau Ksara winery. Expect hotel pickup, a Lebanese lunch, an air-conditioned vehicle, and a group capped at 15. Guides may include Albert, Hassan, Alfred, or Mariana.
From · $65
Read our review →
2
Guided Small-Group Tour to Jeita, Harissa, Byblos with Lunch
from $60
3
Paragliding Trip Over Lebanon – Jounieh Bay
from $100
4
Jeita Grotto,Harissa&Byblos Full-Day PRIVATE-CAR Trip from Beirut
from $75
5
Anjar, Baalbek & Ksara Day Trip – With Lunch (4G on Board)
from $95
6
Byblos, Jeita Grotto & Harissa Day Trip -With Lunch (4G on Board)
from $98
7
Anjar – Ksara Trip From Beirut
from $34
8
Private Anjar and Baalbek Tour from Beirut with Departure Ticket
from $75
The Cedars sit at six thousand feet and the road up shuts in snow.
Bcharre on its shelf above the Qadisha gorge, and the grove of old trees in the bowl behind it. This is the longest day out of Beirut and the one people talk about when they get home.
What a day out in Lebanon actually costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by price. The Bekaa and the coast both come in under the cost of a night out in Beirut.
Airport runs, the sightseeing bus, a half day around Beirut and the cheaper seats on the north loop.
The full-day standards: Baalbek and the Bekaa, Jeita with Harissa and Byblos, Sidon and Tyre with lunch.
A private car with a driver, the multi-day runs, and the cooking days built around one family kitchen.
Mezze that keeps arriving, and Roman cellars under the Bekaa.
Lunch is written into almost every day trip here and it is rarely an afterthought. Book Ksara for the vaults cut by Roman hands, a class in a Beirut flat for the kibbeh, and leave the afternoon open.
Three things that happen in Lebanon and nowhere else.
Roman ruins and mountain villages exist all over this coast. A river cave you cross by boat, the largest temple the Romans ever raised, and the last stand of the forest that roofed Solomon do not.
The Jeita Grotto
Two galleries cut through the same limestone. The upper one is a walkway among stalactites the size of trees; the lower is an underground river you cross by boat when the water is low enough to let you. An American missionary found it in 1836, it was opened properly a century later, and it still closes whenever the Nahr al-Kalb runs high.
- 1Guided Small-Group Tour to Jeita, Harissa, Byblos with Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 361 reviews
- 2Jeita Grotto,Harissa&Byblos Full-Day PRIVATE-CAR Trip from Beirut★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 222 reviews
- 3Byblos, Jeita Grotto & Harissa Day Trip -With Lunch (4G on Board)★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 145 reviews
The six columns of Baalbek
The temple of Jupiter at Baalbek was the largest the Romans ever built, and six of its columns still stand at close to twenty metres. The temple of Bacchus beside it is more complete than anything left in Rome. Half an hour down the valley, Anjar is the only Umayyad city of its kind still standing anywhere.
- 1Guided Small-Group Tour to Baalbek, Anjar and Ksara with Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 511 reviews
- 2Anjar, Baalbek & Ksara Day Trip – With Lunch (4G on Board)★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 181 reviews
- 3Anjar – Ksara Trip From Beirut★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 80 reviews
The last of the cedars
A few hundred trees in a bowl at the head of the Qadisha, some of them well past a thousand years old. This is what is left of the forest that roofed Solomon and planked Phoenician hulls, and the walk through the whole grove takes about twenty minutes. In winter it is under snow and the road to it is not there.
- 1Guided Small-Group Tour to Qadisha, Bcharee & Cedars with Lunch★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 39 reviews
- 2Cedars of Lebanon, Qozhaya, & Bcharre – With Lunch (4G on Board)★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 34 reviews
- 3Cedars, Bsharre & Kozhaya Day Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 15 reviews
Four Lebanese bookings that will not wait.
Most of this country can be arranged the night before, over a table, by someone who knows someone. These four run on gates, cable-car hours, a mountain road and one small kitchen.
- 01Guided Small-Group Tour to Baalbek, Anjar and Ksara with LunchIt is a two-hour drive each way over the pass. The small-group runs leave once in the morning and they do fill.
- 02Guided Small-Group Tour to Jeita, Harissa, Byblos with LunchThe grotto closes when the river runs high, and the galleries shut for maintenance in the cold months. Check before you build a day around it.
- 03Guided Small-Group Tour to Qadisha, Bcharee & Cedars with LunchSnow shuts the road above Bcharre for a good part of the winter. Out of season the grove is simply not reachable.
- 04Authentic Lebanese Cooking Lesson and Meal with Tania’s Family in BeirutThese run in a private kitchen with a handful of seats at the table, and they go before anything else on the site.
Snow closes the Qadisha road. The coast never notices.
From December the passes above Bcharre and into the Bekaa run to snow, and the cedar grove can be out of reach for weeks at a time. The coast road stays open all winter, and so does every port strung along it.
By place — coast, mountain and Bekaa
By kind of day — ruin, cave, cellar or coast road
Beirut, the north loop, the Bekaa, then south: the week almost everybody does first.
The newest Lebanese tour reviews.
The rest of the new ones →
Journey Through Time: Half-Day Private Tour to Baalbek
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Small Group Tours to Jeita Grotto and Byblos with tickets
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Traveling Spoon Lebanese Mezze Private Online Cooking Class
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Small-Group Tour with Lunch to Jeita Grotto, Byblos and Harissa
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Small-Group Tour with Lunch to Baalbek, Anjar and Ksara
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Small-Group Tour to Sidon, Tyre and Maghdouche with Lunch and Tickets
Read our review →
Beirut to Qadisha Valley, Bcharri & Cedar: Daily Tours with Lunch
Read our review →
Beirut to Sidon, Tyre and Maghdouché: Daily Tours with Lunch
Read our review →
Guided Semi-Private Tour to Jeita, Harissa & Byblos
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Baalbek, Anjar and Ksara Guided Full-Day Tour from Beirut
Read our review →