The journey to Amuda would take us ~3 hours.


A stationary Pumpjack. The north of Syria is strategically important as it contains a large percentage of Syria's oil supplies. With the Syrian Civil war there is limited route for both export and facilities for refining, and hence most of oil production is used domestically and the rest has been idled.


The first steps toward creating an autonomous Kurdish region within Syria began shortly after the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War, when the Kurds largely excluded themselves from the opposition Syrian National Council due to the involvement of Turkey. Instead, the Kurdish Supreme Committee was formed by agreement between the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and the Kurdish National Council (KNC) under the guidance of Iraqi Kurdistan president Massoud Barzani in July 2012.

A small store in the countryside. After seeing images of destruction and mayhem on television of Syria, it was quite enlightening to see relative peace and calm.