I Entered Syria Alone and With No Plans in 2026
I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. But honestly, I never really do.
No hotel booked. No idea what the visa process was. No clue what time the border closed. I did not even know how to get from Beirut to Damascus. After 7 years of travel, this was easily the most unprepared I had ever been for a trip, and I had chosen Syria of all places to test my luck.
But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let's start in Beirut.
Arriving in Beirut and Meeting an Old Friend
After 36 hours of flights I land in Beirut with no taxi waiting and no real plan beyond "get to Syria."
I fly in on the red-eye from Turkey and for the first time ever, an airline staff member asks me "Have you been to Israel?" while boarding a flight to Lebanon. I mean, of all the flights. Once I land, the first order of business is surprising my good friend Fouad at his cafe in Jounieh. I do this every time I come back: walk in, act casual, watch him lose his mind. A few months before, I did the same thing and the video became the most viewed clip I have ever posted. Around 150 million views across everything: “WHAT’S UP YOU FUCKING CUNT”
Fouad's cafe had been open for around 5 months and was going well. Good coffee, consistent quality, and a real Lebanese experience. I highly suggest visiting if you are in Lebanon.
The Money Problem
Syria runs on USD cash. There are no booking platforms that work properly, cards are useless, and the black market exchange rate is around 12,000 Syrian pounds to the dollar compared to maybe 1,500 or 2,000 on the official rate. So before crossing I need to pull out as much cash as possible.
The good thing about Lebanon compared to when I visited in 2021 is that the whole economy has been dollarised. Everything can be paid in USD and ATMs dispense good old benjamins. The only issue is that the ATM has a maximum withdrawal of $400 per transaction, so I end up doing 4 runs and walk away with $1,600 USD. That felt like enough at the time.
Spoiler: It was not.
Finding a Ride to Damascus
I genuinely do not know how to get to Damascus. There are apparently taxi stands in Beirut, but we are in Jounieh, which is not exactly Beirut. Fouad helps sort something out. We flag someone down and that someone offers to take me to the border for $150. I had read that you can get from Beirut to Damascus for $100, so I ask him to drop me downtown and try to find a better deal there.
Eventually I find a driver at a shared taxi stand who agrees to take me all the way to Damascus for $100. Done. Easy. Way easier than I expected, except it was not quite what I thought. I did not fully understand what he said, but more on that later.
It is now 14:45pm. I had wanted to leave at 11:00am. The border closes at some point, I assume, but I have absolutely no idea when.
I try anyway. We get on the road and the drive is actually beautiful, city views first and then mountains after.
About 5 kilometres out from the border, traffic slows to a crawl. Trucks, cars, and motorcycles all flying Syrian flags. People hanging out of windows. Something is clearly being celebrated but I have no internet, no translator, and no way of figuring out what is going on. Everyone is waving and honking and it is completely chaotic in the best possible way.
I later find out they are celebrating 1 year since the fall of the Assad regime. I had not planned any of this, which made it feel even more extraordinary. To end up in Syria at that exact moment and experience something like that first-hand is the kind of thing that does not happen twice.
Back to the border. When we arrive, the driver starts asking for money, except we are only halfway through the journey, or so I thought. Turns out he never agreed to drive me to Damascus at all, only to the border. To be fair, that actually makes sense since he would have had to cross into another country with me. I cannot blame him for that. What did catch me off guard was the way he asked. He starts shouting "give me my money, give me my money!" as if I had any intention of not paying him. I have no internet to translate and it becomes a tense back and forth with a man who is not calming down.
Luckily a guy nearby speaks basic English and steps in to help sort the situation. He also turns out to be my next driver, agreeing to take me from the Lebanese border to Damascus for $40.
Once that is settled I head in to get my passport stamped. The Lebanese side is tense so I do not film much. There is a lot going on in that region right now and pulling out a camera at a military checkpoint felt like a very bad idea.
The Syrian side is more orderly. Visa on arrival for Australians costs $150 USD and Syria has a staggered pricing system where different nationalities pay different amounts. There are about 6 checkpoints between the border and Damascus and every time I think we are through, another one appears.
But at each one there is a billboard that says "Welcome to Syria." And that is when I know I finally made it.
Welcome to Damascus
By the time we reach the city it is completely dark. Damascus is enormous and gridlocked, fireworks going off across the skyline, police everywhere. My driver pulls over outside a military base to try and change a $100 bill, a soldier immediately comes over and tells us to move, and I am sitting in the passenger seat with no keys and no Arabic thinking: mate, I genuinely cannot help you here.
We get through it. The driver sorts the money, I tip him, and I hop into what is probably the 6th taxi of the day to cover the last stretch to the old town. Turns out the area I am heading to is much further than either of us thought and he cannot take me all the way there.
Before we move on, let's run the expenses for the day: $50 from the airport to Jounieh, $50 from Jounieh to Beirut, $100 from Beirut to the border, $50 to get dropped in Damascus, plus $150 for the visa. That is $400 before I have eaten a single thing. Almost a third of my cash, gone on day one before I even saw a bed.
Anyway, the new driver is kind, does not speak much English, and we try to chat for a bit before settling into a comfortable silence and enjoying the drive through the city, right up until the next problem arrives.
Arriving at the Hotel
Once again, the driver couldn't take me all the way to the hotel. The closest he could get me was a 15 minute walk away, so I paid him and started walking through the city, by myself, at night, in Syria.
I walked down a narrow street in the old town, found a door that looked like it might be someone's house, walked in, and it turned out to be exactly the hotel I was looking for. They had a room available for $70 a night, which was apparently on the cheaper end when you couldn't book anything through Booking.com or Trip.com because of sanctions.
The room had traditional wooden architecture, Syrian decorations on the walls, and a TV. I had never been more grateful to sit on a bed in my life.
I settled in, put my phone on charge, took a nap, and got ready to head out for my first Syrian meal.
Dinner in the Old Town
It was late, I couldn't remember exactly what time, but I was absolutely starving. I headed out and started wandering with no real plan, just hoping to find somewhere nearby and walk in.
At some point I bumped into some kids and we tried to talk. Their English was honestly the best I had encountered so far in Syria. We made some jokes about the fireworks and about me missing a finger, and after I told them I was hungry they pointed me toward a local spot. We said goodbye and I headed over.
The restaurant was called Arabesque, about a kilometre into the old town. I walked in, couldn't read the menu, had no Google Translate because I still had no internet, and just pointed at things while saying the words "chicken shawarma" to make it as easy as possible for everyone involved.
What arrived was not what I expected. Instead of a wrap, the shawarma came cut into bite-sized pieces on a platter with vegetables, sliced potatoes, herbs, chilli bread, and a generous amount of toum. The full meal plus water came to 45,000 Syrian pounds, which was about $4. Not bad for a first meal in Syria.
Free Dessert From a Local
On the way back I walked past a traditional bakery and decided to grab a kanafeh.
If you have never had it, kanafeh is a Syrian-origin dessert made from shredded angel-hair pastry layered with soft white cheese, baked until the outside is golden and crispy while the inside goes warm and gooey, then finished with rose water-scented sugar syrup and crushed pistachios. It is one of those things you try once and immediately start thinking about when you can have it again.
I set up my camera and started eating. It was delicious.
Zane, the guy behind the counter, refused to take my money. Then he told me to wait a minute and came back with something called hareeseh, which is a dense semolina cake soaked in fragrant rose water syrup and topped with nuts. Think of it as the Middle East's answer to a syrup cake, except better.
I tried to pay one more time. He refused again. Syria was barely a few hours old for me and a stranger had already given me dessert at no charge.
We were off to a good start.
Final Thoughts
There is a lot more to come from Syria. I spent over 3 weeks in the country, visited places that are genuinely off limits to most people, and had experiences that after 7 years of travel I genuinely did not think were possible.
As I edited the footage, my main thought was that I really, truly did not know what I was getting into when I crossed that border. And somehow that turned out to be exactly the right way to enter.
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