As planned, I was taken from work out to the mountains, and it was wonderful. The sun was shining when Khalid and Mustafa collected me, and we took a tortuous route past demolished buildings (as is the norm here) to the outskirts of Tripoli. Out on the edge of town there is a phenomenal amount of building taking place - flats, houses, and business parks. The plan is, I gather, to move large chunks of the population out of town to rebuild the city to have wide streets, hotels, and easily accessible business areas. Khalid asked me if I wanted to have a go at driving, but I'm not quite ready for that yet: the road rules here are bizarre in the extreme, even down to on which side to drive; indicators are troublesome irritations.
Once out of town, the roads improved considerably, and in no time we were out into the mountains - about 80 kms south: 
We climbed up one section to get the view, and then back down via a wadi which was still running with a little water from the rains earlier this month - Mustafa called back to me to keep an eye open for snakes because they liked the damp grass...hmmmmm! The date palms were lush in the little valley:
In one area, supposedly rife with scorpions at the height of summer (it was pleasantly cool today), we came upon some caves which were lived in until quite recently:
There was a flat bit outside so Khalid and Mustafa used the time to have their afternoon prayers. I waited in a cave for them to finish:
On the way back we got stopped by the police - lucky I wasn't driving!
