Ski Season in Lebanon

The life of a Middle East correspondent isn't all bombs and riots. In fact, (though I may regret letting my editors in on the secret) when there isn't a war, the living in Lebanon is pretty darn easy.

Today was one of the first sunny days of ski season in the Mount Lebanon region. Here's a photograph from Faraya Mazar, the country's most developed ski resort, which is about an hour north of Beirut by car. The short distance means you can attend a dinner party in town on Saturday night, get your full eight hours of sleep, and still be on the slopes by around 10 o'clock the next morning. And since Lebanese social circles are -- like the country itself -- pretty small, chances are you'll see your pals from Saturday night on the mountain too.

Skiing is possible in Lebanon because the swift rise of the coastal mountain range, coming after the broad flat expanse of the open sea, creates updrafts that keep the high country cold even when it might be sixty degrees on the shore. While the old cliche -- that in Lebanon you can go alpine skiing in the morning and water skiing in the afternoon -- might be technically true, I don't know anyone who's tried. Even in March and early April (which is as long as the ski season lasts) the Mediterranean is too cold for much more than a quick dip. But it's exhilarating enough just sliding off a chair-lift with the Mediterranean on one side, and biblical Mt. Hermon on the other. Pinch yourself: the Arabian peninsula is that-a-way.

In this photograph, you can see how rapidly snow disappears as the mountains roll down to the sea. And just in case you weren't sure which religious group is the majority in these here parts, the owners of the ski resort have turned steel ski-lift girders into crosses on several of the high ridge-lines.

As cars head back down from the hills to the coast on Sunday afternoon, many of them will have a strange new white hood ornaments. Snowmen are a winter status symbol that tell everyone in your home village that you've been up in the mountains for the weekend. The fact that the snowmen often block windshield visibility doesn't seem to bother anyone. As my skiing buddy, Alex, who is himself Lebanese, said today when an errant snowboarder went crashing through the plastic orange protective webbing separating skiers and the lunchtime crowd sunning themselves at a base lodge: "They ski like they drive."

By Andrew Lee Butters/Faraya