We arrived at al-Madīnah, the second holiest city in Islam after Mecca. The city lies 625 meters above sea level on a fertile oasis. It is bounded east by an extensive lava field and on the other three sides by the Hejaz mountain range. Unlike Mecca, Al-Madīnah is open to everyone...
We spent a night in another holy city, Al-Najaf. It lies on a ridge just west of the Euphrates River, about 160 kilometers south of Baghdad. It is one of Shiʿi Islam’s two major holy cities (the other is Karbalā) and is widely held to be the resting place of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib...
We wandered the whole evening around Karbala – Shiite Islam’s principal holy city. It lies 88 kilometers southwest of Baghdad. The city’s religious significance derives from the Battle of Karbala (680 CE), a one-sided contest in which al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī, the Shiʿi leader...
We have arrived at the site in the late afternoon when the sun created a great light and shadows play at The Hill of Crosses. It is a Christian pilgrimage site with a collection of over 100,000 wooden crucifixes and other religious icons erected on a hill outside the city of Šiauliai in...