A country · 47 places · 12 regions

Yemen, all of it.

47 curated places across 12 regions — photographed, mapped, and noted with the season each is best in.

Dar al-Hajar · via Wikimedia Commons

The 4 biggest regions — Hadhramaut Governorate, Sanaa, Ta'izz Governorate and Marib Governorate — read below as chapters, with 8 more waiting past them.

Chapter I · Hadhramaut Governorate · 8 places

Hadhramaut Governorate

A desert-valley town celebrated as a centre of Islamic scholarship, its skyline crowded with mud-brick palaces and the towering minaret of the Al-Muhdhar mosque. Palm groves and Hadrami merchant mansions fringe the wadi.

Tarim, Hadhramaut

Hadhramaut Governorate, Yemen

✦ November to February · $

Al Muhdhar Mosque

Hadhramaut Governorate, Yemen

✦ October–March · $

Qalansiyah

Hadhramaut Governorate, Yemen

✦ October to April

All 8 places in Hadhramaut Governorate →

via Wikimedia Commons

Chapter II · Sanaa · 6 places

Sanaa

Dar al-Hajar, the Rock Palace, is a former royal summer residence built atop a natural rock pinnacle in the Wadi Dhahr valley outside Sana'a. Its several storeys of mud brick and stone rise seamlessly from the crag, so that palace and rock appear to be a single form. Built in the early twentieth century for a Yemeni imam on the site of older structures, it has become an emblem of highland Yemeni architecture. Visitors can climb through its narrow rooms and window recesses and look out over the surrounding valley of gardens.

✦ October–March · $

Meet Dar al-Hajar All 6 places in Sanaa →

Chapter III · Ta'izz Governorate · 4 places

Ta'izz Governorate

Al Mokha is a historic port town on Yemen's Red Sea coast that gave its name to a variety of coffee once shipped from its harbour across the world. For centuries it was the principal outlet through which coffee grown in the Yemeni highlands reached international markets, drawing merchants of many nations. Though the port declined as trade shifted elsewhere, the town retains old mosques and the memory of its role in coffee history. Visitors can view the weathered coastal buildings of a place whose name became a byword for coffee.

Al Mokha

Ta'izz Governorate, Yemen

✦ November–February · $

Al Qahira Castle

Ta'izz Governorate, Yemen

Al-Ashrafiya Mosque, Taiz

Ta'izz Governorate, Yemen

All 4 places in Ta'izz Governorate →

via Wikimedia Commons

Chapter IV · Marib Governorate · 3 places

Marib Governorate

The walled ancient city of Yathill, ringed by towering stone ramparts rising from the desert plain. Its temple and inscriptions belong to the caravan kingdoms that controlled the incense trade.

Meet Baraqish All 3 places in Marib Governorate →