Chouf Mountains

The attractive wooded slopes of the Chouf Mountains are located to the south and east of Beirut and contain the beautiful late 18th-century Beiteddine Palace, the finest surviving example of Lebanese-Ottoman architecture in the country. The palace was built by the Ottoman governor of Lebanon, Emir Bashir, and is set on a mountainside overlooking a peaceful valley. Emir Bashir employed the finest architects and created an enormous complex comprising three central courtyards, numerous lavishly decorated rooms in the Syrian style, and a grand all-marble hammam (baths) complex. In the lower part of the palace is a magnificent collection of large Byzantine mosaics. The village of Deir al-Qamar, a short drive from Beiteddine, is considered one of the country’s best-preserved examples of 17th and 18th-century architecture and one of Lebanon’s prettiest villages.