Notes on usage:

• Click on the text "المشرق ❊ the levant" in the upper left corner of any page to go back.
• On pages with single pictures, clicking on the picture will bring up a larger version that can be magnified.
• Clicking on pictures with the caption "(QTVR panorama)" will bring up a full page interactive Quick Time panorama if the Quick Time plug-in (which can be obtained at no cost here) is installed.

Acknowledgements:

• My thanks to Ali Mneimneh for all his help and patience in exploring the Beirut-Riyaq and Beirut-Tripoli lines.
• The Continental Railway Circle has graciously allowed the reproduction of two chapters from Hugh Hughes' Middle East Railways
• Our thanks to General Elias Ghazali of the Syrian Army for permission to photograph at Riyaq in 2002.
• Toufoul Abou-Hodeib has kindly researched and translated the Arabic resources and contributed photographs from our explorations in the Beqaa.

Photograph credits:

• Unless otherwise mentioned all photographs are by Børre Ludvigsen.

- Børre Ludvigsen