Guided Small-Group Tour to Tripoli and Batroun with Lunch

I visited Lebanon for one week in June 2025 and stayed in Beirut. I spent two days in Beirut alone and took four day tours outside of Beirut with this company. The Jeita Gotto, another site that I had signed up to visit, was closed during that time, but the company made up for it by taking me to a couple of extra sites in Tripoli and sending me to Batroun on a different day. Hassane was my guide for both cities. He did a wonderful job. He was extremely competent, knowledgeable, and courteous. I had an excellent experience here and everywhere else that I visited. Tripoli is the northernmost major city in Lebanon. It is one of the country’s poorest places and the center of a large number of camps for Palestinian and Syrian migrants. The city is overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim. In Tripoli, we visited the Tripoli Citadel, a massive Crusader-era castle built in the early 12th century overlooking the city. We walked through the city souk and visited two Mamluk-era mosques from the late 13th and early 14th centuries: the Mansouri Grand Mosque and the Taynal Mosque. I forget the name of the restaurant where we ate, but it was very good. We then went to Rabbits Island. As someone who studies the Crusades, I knew it as a place with a church to which many people fled as Tripoli was retaken by Muslim forces in 1289, only to be massacred. There were a few ruined buildings there which Hassane said dated from the 19th century, but not much else to see. The standard tour includes just the Tripoli Citadel, the souk, the Grand Mosque, and lunch at a restaurant. The Taynal Mosque and the island were added in to compensate for the loss of Jeita, which was fine by me. Because I could not visit Jeita, I did Batroun with Hassane on a different day in combination with Harissa and Byblos. Batroun is a mostly Christian city, but it is more diverse than Tripoli and has a substantial Muslim minority. The city provides a beautiful view of the Mediterranean with a Phoenician-era wall. We entered Our Lady of the Sea Church, a little Greek Orthodox church on the coastline built in the 19th century. We walked through the town a little before going back to the area where we parked, stopping first at Saint Stephen’s Cathedral, a 20th century Maronite church built on the remains of what is believed to have been a smaller Crusader church. We only stayed in Batroun for about an hour, which is less than what we spent in some other places, but I feel as though I saw the most important sites that the city had to offer. Tripoli is an excellent place to learn about the history of the Crusades and medieval Muslim history, and provides a great opportunity to experience Sunni Muslim culture. I highly recommend it. Batroun was definitely worth the one-hour visit. Hassane was excellent and substantially added to my understanding and appreciation of the past and present history of both cities.

It is an amazing experience. To see the history, level and people of Tripoli. Batroun was the best place I have ever seen in my life. Thank you our guide Hassane.

Our tour to Tripoli amd Batroun was excellent, due mostly to the superb professionalism, courtesy and knowledge of our friendly guide Albert. The car was clean and in good condition, everything advertised for the trip was done and at high standards. We had fun, learned a lot and just had a totally relaxing day, full of interesting sight visits, delicious food and causal enjoyment of walking around the towns. We did some shopping, tastes local specialities, met locals and hear great stories. I wish we would have had Albert for other tours we did at other companies. Had we known how great this company is, we would have done all out trips with them and asked for Albert as out guide.