City by city
Where you can go, city by city
What each place is, whether it's currently safe to visit, and how long it's worth. Damascus and the west function largely normally for visitors; other areas do not — this is the honest split as of October 2026, so check again before you travel. Times are driving times, which in Syria means checkpoints included.
The Dead Cities
Around seven hundred limestone settlements scattered across the hills between Aleppo and Idlib, abandoned between the eighth and tenth centuries and left almost untouched since — houses, olive presses, churches and tombs still standing to roof height. Serjilla and al-Bara are the most visited. UNESCO lists them as the Ancient Villages of Northern Syria. The wider governorate remains unsettled, so this is a guided trip, not a self-drive one.
- Serjilla is the most complete single site
- Pair with St Simeon's basilica, north of Aleppo
- Status
- Guided access; check current conditions
- Worth
- Full day from Aleppo
- From Damascus
- 5 hours
- Best time
- Spring, when the hills green
This is the underrated risk. Contamination is widespread in former front-line areas, around Palmyra, and along old defensive lines. The rule is simple and absolute: stay on hard-surfaced roads and worn paths, never enter a ruined building or an open field, and never take a shortcut across ground you have not seen someone else walk.