Things to do in Beirut

Nature · Ain El Mreisseh to Raouche

The seafront promenade along the western edge of the city — fishermen, joggers, families, coffee carts and the Pigeon Rocks at the far end.

Local tip: Free, open to everyone, and the most reliably functioning public space in Lebanon — it works when very little else does. Sunset over Raouche is the city's shared ritual. Go on foot from Ain El Mreisseh and buy a coffee and a kaak from a cart on the way.

Culture · Badaro, on the old Green Line

Lebanon's principal archaeological museum — Phoenician sarcophagi, Roman mosaics and a collection spanning several thousand years.

Local tip: The building sat directly on the civil war's Green Line and the staff encased the collection in concrete to save it. The basement gallery, reopened later, tells that story as well as showing the objects. It is one of the great museums of the Mediterranean and is rarely busy.

Neighborhood · West Beirut

The district around the American University — bookshops, old cafés, cinemas and one of the few genuinely walkable street grids in the city.

Local tip: Hamra Street's café culture was the intellectual centre of the Arab world in the 1960s and 70s and something of that survives. It is also the most practical part of Beirut to live in without a car. Go on a weekday morning rather than a weekend evening.

Nightlife · East Beirut, beside the port

The bar, restaurant and design district along Armenia Street, immediately adjacent to the port and among the areas worst damaged in 2020, substantially rebuilt since.

Local tip: It is open and busy again, and the rebuilding was largely done by the people who lived and worked there. Come on a weekday evening when you can actually get a table and talk to people. The staircases up to Achrafieh from Gouraud Street are the best walk in the city.

Culture · Achrafieh

A 19th-century villa turned modern art museum, severely damaged in the 2020 explosion and reopened in 2023 after restoration.

Local tip: The restoration is part of what you are looking at — the museum is explicit about what was destroyed and what was saved. The surrounding streets of Achrafieh, with their Ottoman-era houses between newer towers, are worth an unhurried hour on foot.

Nature · Southern Beirut, between Badaro, Tayouneh and Qasqas

The city's only large green space — a pine forest of roughly 300,000 square metres, closed to the public for decades and reopened in stages.

Local tip: Most residents have never been, and many do not know it is open. It is the only real forest inside an Arab capital, it sits at the meeting point of several of Beirut's divided districts, and it is quiet. Check the current opening hours before going, because they have changed repeatedly.