The Snowboarder's Journal - frequency 17.2
AMONGST THE CEDARS OF GOD
Words and Photos: Mirte van Dijk 2019-10-21 18:55:41
It’s 4 a.m. and the night is still dominating the light. On the left, the dark squares of future windows are visible in the concrete of an unfinished hotel. On the right, nothing—just me, Elena Koenz, Valerie Schlieper and the mountains at the top of the Lebanon’s Kadisha Valley. They form a border between leisure on one side and survival on the other. About 60 miles past those mountains are Syrian refugee camps. In this country with nearly 7,000 years of history, conflict still marks the social and physical landscape. But it’s also a place of beauty, intrigue and tall peaks.
The name “Lebanon” derives from the Semitic root laban, which means “to be white,” a reference to her snowcapped peaks. They are home to countless adventures and stories waiting to be told in this ancient Phoenician state. We are here to explore those peaks for 10 days, together with a few local friends—new friends who we met during another trip at another place. We all speak snowboard, right?
Lebanon’s highest mountains are located here in the North Governorate, including Qurnat as Sawda’ at 10,131 feet. The Cedars Ski Resort, established in 1953 when the government built its first lift, sits below it adjacent the nearby the town of Bsharri. The base of the resort sits at nearly 7,000 feet of elevation and rises 2,500 vertical feet. It’s now served by three chairlifts—four if you count the army’s exclusive lift—and claims nine kilometers of slopes, but that doesn’t take the runs back to Bsharri into consideration.
As the sun rises and paints the bowl below us pink, it’s hard to calculate the distance, steepness and height of the mountains. There’s no map, no time schedule and no reliable weather forecast. All we can do is examine the snow, focus on our footsteps and try to find the path of least resistance through crusty flakes. We do know about the land-mine-strewn terrain to our far left.
From higher up you can look deep into the holy Kadisha Valley, the home of many pilgrims. But the most intriguing part of the view is a glimpse of the Cedars of God, a remarkable UNESCO World Heritage Site, right at the bottom of the resort.
We are standing in front of the tree that is represented on the Lebanese flag. My snowboard is in my left hand as my right caresses the deep lines of a bark that has endured 300 years of weather. The trees sway peacefully in a soft wind. The oldest ones reach 130 feet into the sky, standing strong on their eight-foot-diameter trunks. In contrast to the snow on the mountain, where frosted tracks are ironed flat by the ice-cold wind, the snow between these trees is fluffy. This 25-acre forest is strictly forbidden to enter without permission, let alone use it for a fun day of riding. We have been granted access thanks to Lebanese Wanderers, a local travel-guide service, which organized the permits for us to freely ride and photograph this space.
The Cedars of God sanctuary is one of the few places where ancient Lebanese cedars still grow. Thousands of years ago, the whole country was covered with cedars, from the mountains to the sea. The Bible describes Lebanese cedar as symbols of strength and eternity, yet the trees have had a hard time surviving. The story goes that the guardians of the forest, the demigods, fought and lost the battle against the humans over this divine woodland. From Phoenicians and Egyptians to Babylonians and Romans, the cedar wood became precious. Yet conservation efforts began with the Roman Emperor Hadrian around 100 AD, and the cedars still stand in small pockets throughout the country.
With a small layer of powder in this magical forest, we find surprisingly more attractive snowboarding than we thought. Every run, every turn feels almost disrespectful to the trees, but we are enjoying the untracked lines. The sun shines upon us, as if nature approves of our joy.
Photo Caption: Elena Koenz among the Cedars of God.
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