Overland through Syria

Anyone have any input for a American traveling overland through Syria? I'm pretty confident in my abilities to get by, but should there be any points of special notice given my nationality? I was thinking of doing a flight into Damascus then going overland Syria-Jordan-Egypt. Possibly a Israel side trip after Jordan but we'll see. Thanks.

Don't worry. Syrians are very friendly. Unless you're wearing a t-shirt saying "I love George Bush", don't expect anyone to hassle you.

Travelling through Syria is pretty straight forward, there is a fairly good bus network, although ascertaining departure times can sometime be a challenge. But your hotel will normally be able to help you sort this out.

If you do plan on visiting Israel, keep any evidence of your plans out of site at the Syrian border.

i just got back from a month long solo trip through lebanon, syria, and jordan.

i'm an american with no arabic skills, and i encountered pretty much no problems the entire time i was in the middle east. people (other than taxi drivers) are really helpful and super-polite - when i mentioned i was from america (specifically texas), the pretty much the most i ever got out of someone unsolicited was a joking comment that i was from the home of bush. i could usually tell when someone wanted to share an opinion, but unless i brought up politics first, no one ever said anything. (a good conversation starter was the iraq shoe-throwing incident, lol). the only exception to this was the first day of israel bombing gaza, when maybe emotions were running a little higher, and i heard some more interesting things ("bush is a donkey, america is a donkey!", etc...i still didn't really feel unsafe). needless to say, i backed away whenever i ran across pro-palestine/anti-israel protests - i don't think anything positive can happen for an american there...

i always identified myself as american when asked, because i think it's really important for americans abroad to be positive cultural ambassadors (especially in the ME where there are almost none of us around), and i hope you'll have the same great experience i did and feel comfortable doing the same.

as for your route, maybe you'd consider doing what i did and flying into amman, then taxi-ing up to syria and looping through the country, because from what i found, there aren't any direct flights to syria from the US (most itineraries have a stopover in amman or istanbul). shared taxis or buses to syria from amman are relatively cheap, plentiful, and fast.

Hello,

Im American living in Syria. In Hama of all places :D I cant agree more with the previous post. Keep your usual precautions and enjoy yourself to the fullest. Its a great place with so much to do and discover. As for flying into Damascus, I to would just go to amman and catch a taxi or bus up. No sense flying up if its just you and a bit of stuff. By the time you layover and then fly up you could have pretty much already been in damascus for about the same amount of time. Hope you have a chance to stop in in Hama.

Take care

Aisha and tribe

You should have no trouble at all, there are a fair few americans and brits around syria.

But dnt bother flying, take the shared taxi from amman, its only a 3hour ride so quicker(considering chacking in/airport waiting time) than flying and much much cheaper

I am from the US and have been in Syria for two weeks with no problems at all. There are lots of people who will ask you "where are you from", but that is usually to get you into some kind of shop. I usually ignore them unless I think it is sincere. I have used the "I'm from Canada" (sorry those from Canada), but only when there are loads of people around. The last one "got" me when he asked who is the current Prime Minister and I didn't respond. One of the reasons I avoid telling people that I am from the US is because they immediately think you are rich and this is not good when trying to negotiate cheap prices.