Syria

Morning pickup at Damascus International Airport, or in Beirut or Amman, with our staff assisting the border crossing. A full-day walking tour of Old Damascus, a UNESCO World Heritage Site: the 18th-century Asaad Pasha Caravanserai, one of the most beautiful in the region; the Azem Palace, a perfect Damascene palace turned folklore museum; the lantern-lit Hamidiyeh Bazar, straight out of the Arabian Nights; and the Ottoman-era Hejaz Train Station that once linked Istanbul to Mecca. Lunch is charcoal-grilled lamb shawarma at the oldest shawarma shop in the world, in business since 1906. We end at the Umayyad Mosque: a place of worship since the first millennium BC: pagan temple, then cathedral, now one of Islam's great mosques. Overnight in Damascus.

A day inside living Damascene culture. Morning visits to the workshops keeping the city's crafts alive: one of the last manual brocade looms in Damascus, a wood-inlay (Damascene mosaic) atelier, and an Ajami painted-wood studio. Past the Damascene Sword monument and up Mount Qassioun for the panoramic view over the capital, then to the war-scarred suburb of Jobar and the ruins of the 2,000-year-old Jobar Synagogue; we don't edit the recent past out of the itinerary. Back in the Hamidiyeh: Bakdash booza, ice cream hand-pounded to the same recipe since 1895; the Hakawati storyteller's show at the 16th-century al-Nawfara Café; and an evening street-food crawl through the Old City. Overnight in Damascus.

Day trip south to Bosra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site that was the capital of the Roman province of Arabia and later a great stopover on the caravan route to Mecca. The magnificent 2nd-century Roman theatre sits intact inside the walls of a 13th-century citadel; beyond it, the black basalt city: the cardo, the bathhouse, the nymphaeum, the Nabatean gate, the Byzantine cathedral, and the Omari Mosque, the oldest mosque in Syria. Overnight in Damascus.

Drive into the Qalamun Mountains to Maaloula and the 4th-century Monastery of Saints Sergius and Bacchus, where prayers are still spoken in Aramaic (the language Christ spoke) followed by the mountain-path trek in the footsteps of Saint Thecla to the cave that holds her tomb. Continue to Deir Mar Musa al-Habashi, the monastery of Saint Moses the Abyssinian, perched in the Qalamun cliffs since the 5th century: the largest surviving church mural of the Middle Ages, prayers in Syriac, and the monks' hour of silent meditation. The monastery is reached by 350 steps cut into the mountainside, so we carry up only what we need for the night. Overnight at Deir Mar Musa.

Breakfast with the monastery community, then east into the Syrian desert to Palmyra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the great cultural centres and trade hubs of the classical world. The Temple of Bel, the Valley of Tombs, the natural spring of Afqa, the Great Colonnade, the amphitheatre, and the Roman Arch of Triumph, and the destruction ISIS left behind in 2017, because Palmyra bears witness as well as dazzles. We sleep in Al-Mishtaya, a village in the Valley of the Christians beneath the Crusader mountains. Overnight in Al-Mishtaya.

Krak des Chevaliers first thing: a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the best-preserved Crusader castle on Earth, built by the Hospitaller Order in the 12th century to control the only gap in the coastal mountains. Down to Tartus, the Knights Templar's last outpost on mainland Syria, for the Cathedral of Our Lady of Tortosa and the 12th–13th-century old town. A thirty-minute boat ride reaches Arwad Island: the only inhabited island on the Syrian coast, with its Phoenician monolithic wall and the fortress where the Templars made their final stand. The day ends on the warm Mediterranean at a Latakia beach resort. Overnight in Latakia.

A slow morning on the Mediterranean, then the scenic mountain road to Saladin Castle, a UNESCO World Heritage Site that T. E. Lawrence called "the most sensational thing in castle-building I have seen." Byzantine foundations from the 10th century, Crusader walls from the 12th, and Ayyubid fortifications added after Saladin took it in 1188, rigid military architecture in a soft green gorge. Continue north to Aleppo. Overnight in Aleppo.

A full day in the UNESCO-listed Old City of Aleppo, continuously inhabited for more than 6,000 years. From the 13th-century Antioch Gate into al-Madina Souk (the world's longest covered souk, 13 km of vaulted lanes) and the caravanserais scattered among them. The Citadel, the most complete example of medieval Islamic military architecture. Then a traditional Laurel Soap Factory, an original 18th-century works still making Aleppo soap to the recipe handed down since the 8th century. Dinner is Aleppo's famous cherry meatballs, or a vegan feast of hummus, falafel, fatteh, and ful. Overnight in Aleppo.

South through the limestone massif and its Dead Cities: more than 700 late-antique settlements whose inhabitants walked away in the early 7th century. We explore the two most complete, Serjilla and al-Bara: villas, churches, and pyramid mausoleums standing empty for 1,400 years, together a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Then Apamea, founded after the death of Alexander the Great, with the longest colonnade of the classical world (nearly two kilometres of marble), the Governor's Palace, and the Damascus Gate. Last, Hama's great wooden waterwheels, creaking along the Orontes as they have since the 13th century. Overnight in Damascus.

A free day in Damascus: wander, shop, sit with a coffee in the Old City, or return to whatever corner of the capital pulled at you on Days 1 and 2. Then the transfer out: to Damascus International Airport, or overland to Beirut or Amman with our staff at the border. Ten days that will redraw the map of the Levant in your head.