Baalbeck
The great temple at Baalbeck or Heliopolis has stood since the beginning of our era when it was one of the wonders of the world. It and the second temple, with its cellar almost intact, make up one of the most beautiful and famous of ancient monuments.
Baalbeck is indeed a place where the visitor can still recapture the fascination and atmosphere of the past. There are legends to explain its exceptional size, its gigantic proportions and huge blocks, particularly the three which each measure between 19-20m. by 4.50 m. by 3.60 m. The temple of Jupiter, the foundations of which are probably pre-Roman, was completed soon after 60 A.D.
The terrace which was planned to surround the temple and to which the three famous blocks belong, dates from the same period but was never finished.During the second century A.D. the grand approach was planned and the great court built with colonnade and exedrae. The temple of Bacchus was built about 150 A.D. The propylaea was added at the beginning of the third century A.D. together with the small round temple and, in the reign of Phillip the Arab (244-249 A.D.), the hexagonal forecourt.

Byblos
Byblos is one of the top contenders for the "oldest continuously inhabited city" award. According to Phoenician tradition it was founded by the god El, and even the Phoenicians considered it a city of great antiquity. Although its beginnings are lost in time, modern scholars say the site of Byblos goes back at least 7,000 years. Ironically, the words "Byblos" and "Phoenicia" would not have been recognized by the city's early inhabitants. For several thousand years it was called "Gubla" and later "Gebal", while the term "Canaan" was applied to the coast in general. It was the Greeks, some time after 1200 B.C., who gave us the name "Phoenicia," referring to the coastal area. They called the city "Byblos" ("papyrus" in Greek), because this commercial center was important in the papyrus trade.
Today Byblos (Jbeil in Arabic) on the coast 37 kilometers north of Beirut, is a prosperous place with glassfronted office buildings and crowded streets. Within the old town, medieval Arab and Crusader remains are continuous reminders of the past. Nearby are the extensive excavations that make Byblos one of the most important archaeological sites in the area.
Sidon is of immense antiquity, but few remains of the ancient city have survived
the ravages of time and man.

Sidon
There is evidence that Sidon was inhabited as long ago as 4000 B.C., and perhaps even earlier, in Neolithic times.
It was twice destroyed in war between the 7th and 4th centuries B.C., and again during the earthquake in the 6th Century A.D. Like most Phoenician cities, Sidon was built on a promontory facing an island, which sheltered its fleet from storms off the sea, and became a refuge during armed incursions from the interior. It surpassed all other Phoenician cities in wealth, commercial initiative, and religious significance.
At the height of the Persian Empire (550-330 B.C.) Sidon provided Persia, a great land power, with the ships and seamen it needed to fight the Egyptians and Greeks. This vital role gave Sidon and its kings a highly favored position during that period

Tyre
Phoenician Tyre was queen of the seas, an island city of unprecedented splendor. She grew wealthy from her far-reaching colonies and her industries of purple-dyed textiles.
But she also attracted the attention of jealous conquerors, among them the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar and Alexander the Great.
Founded at the start of the third millennium B.C., Tyre originally consisted of a mainland settlement and a modest island city that lay a short distance off shore. But it was not until the first millennium B.C. that the city experienced its golden age. In the 10th century B.C. Hiram, King of Tyre, joined two islets by landfill. Later he extended the city further by reclaiming a considerable area from the sea.
Phoenician expansion began about 815 B.C. when traders from Tyre founded Carthage in North Africa.
Eventually its colonies spread around the Mediterranean and Atlantic, bringing to the city a flourishing maritime trade. But prosperity and power make their own enemies. Early in the sixth century B.C.
Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, laid siege to the walled city for thirteen years. Tyre stood firm, but it is probable that at this time the residents of the mainland city abandoned it for the safety of the island.
In 332 B.C. Alexander the Great set out to conquer this strategic coastal base in the war between the Greeks and the Persians. Unable to storm the city, he blockaded Tyre for seven months. Again Tyre held on. But the conqueror used the debris of the abandoned mainland city to build a causeway and once within reach of the city walls, Alexander used his siege engines to batter and finally breach the fortifications.
It is said that Alexander was so enraged at the Tyrian's defense and the loss of his men that he destroyed half the city. The town's 30,000 residents were massacred or sold into slave.

Cedars
The Cedars of Lebanon are an integral part of the history of the country, just as the antique cities of Byblos, Tyre and Baalbek. They date back to antiquity, when the Phoenicians were exporting cedar-wood to the pharaohs from the apparently inexhaustible forests which at the
time covered the upper reaches of the mountains.
The wood was not only used for construction but more especially for nobler purposes;
this was the sacred wood of the gods and used to honour the dead, a task to which the people of the ancient Orient attached deep importance.
The most venerable representatives of the Cedars of Lebanon, which once covered the entire country, are in the Besharre region of North Lebanon. Some 400 trees, many between 1,200 and 2,000 years old stand on slopes 2,000 meters high in the shadow of the 3,100 - meter peak of Qornet Es-Sawda. From Lebanon's cedar forests Solomon got the wood for his temple and palace and from its wood the pharaohs carved their sarcopaghi and their "sun ships". In addition to the Cedar forest, there are a number of sites of interest in the area.
The town of Bsharri is best known as the birthplace and resting place of Gibran Khalil Gibran, Lebanon's most famous mystic poet, artist and novelist. The Gibran Museum a converted monastery houses his paintings, drawings, and personal effects, as well as his casket. The town also has three churches and a waterfall.

Jeita Caverns
Few caverns in the world approach the astounding wealth or the extent of those of Jeita. In these caves and galleries, known to man since Paleolithic times, the action of water has created cathedral-like vaults beneath the wooded hills of Mount Lebanon.
Over a distance of 650 meters, on two levels, the lower one in a boat and the upper one on foot, following perfectly made cement gangways, the tourist picks his winding way through darkly forbidding caverns.
Sometimes he passes through vast halls the size of a cathedral - some of the grandiose naves seem to contain giant organs or the vast chandeliers of madmen - and sometimes through narrow corridors.