Ouadi Qadisha (the Holy Valley) and the Forest of the Cedars of God (Horsh Arz el-Rab)

Hermits and whole monastic communities took refuge for over a millennium in the Qadisha gorge, the Holy Valley of Lebanon, where rock-cut chapels and ancient monasteries — several of the Maronite church's most venerable — cling to sheer cliff faces. On the heights nearby survives the Forest of the Cedars of God, a remnant of the legendary cedar stands whose timber built the temples of antiquity. UNESCO inscribed valley and forest together in 1998.