Half a day in Aleppo: from Jdeydeh to Ouroubah

The northern quarters of Aleppo feel like a different city from the old town in the south: wide avenues, flat fronts, recent history. This walk shows that difference through four buildings. 1400 metres in all, the longest leg 600 metres. Three of the stops are churches and one is a mosque, and all four stand close enough to see one from another.

The route

Start in Jdeydeh. The Greek Orthodox Church of the Virgin does not stand alone; it opens onto the same courtyard as the Armenian Cathedral of the Forty Martyrs, and the two come into one view. From there walk north-west into Aziziyeh: the Latin Church is on Faris al-Khoury Street, 600 metres on. Its towers are not a matched pair, so cross the road to see the difference. Another 430 metres north-east brings you to the Church of the Holy Cross in the Ouroubah quarter, single-domed, with the bell tower above the door. The last leg runs 410 metres west to the right bank of the Quwayq: the four round minarets of the Tawhid Mosque show from a distance and save you asking the way.

Timing

Sunday morning is best. Be in the Jdeydeh courtyard at 09:00; the stone reads in side light and the doors are open at service time. Reach the Latin Church, opened in 1937, at about 10:00 — outside services the door may be locked, and then you ask at the monastery beside it. The Holy Cross was consecrated in 1993 and the same rule holds: outside service hours you ask at the garden gate. The mosque opened in 1981; the avenue quietens in the afternoon and is crowded when Friday prayers end.

Take care

All four are in use for worship: cover shoulders and knees, do not photograph during a service, and shoes come off in the mosque. Church doors can be shut outside service hours, so build the morning around those hours rather than against them. Restoration may be under way in Jdeydeh; ask the shopkeepers in the quarter before you go. The streets are narrow and you will cross the road often to see a front whole, so watch the traffic.