Fabulous Tripoli

Libya may have transformed from pariah state to holiday hotspot but it is still spectacularly exotic, says John Gimlette. Libya is in the throes of a subtle revolution. It isn't exactly one of those velvet jobs. No, it has a distinctly camel-hair feel.

The souqs are now wired up to the web, and there are satellite dishes among the minarets. Lightbulbs are back and there's even a hint of the boutique riad.

But don't for a minute think there's been an outbreak of "normality". Tripoli is still spectacularly exotic. Tribesmen fish along the Corniche, and the supermarkets sell ostrich eggs. Most of the buildings are either extravagantly fascist (thanks to Mussolini) or fantasies in plaster, straight out of The Arabian Nights.

There are few detailed maps, no railways since 1965 and nothing is quite as it seems or as it should be. Cars are still scarce and there's no coinage because it's all been melted down by pedlars from Egypt. At night a darkness descends on the medina that is relieved only by gas lamps.

Tripoli is often described as an Arabian Havana. This may seem odd in a city where both alcohol and swimming trunks are illegal, and where women are exhorted to be equal to men but discouraged from appearing in public. But you can see what they mean. There's that same sense of time suspended and the political slogans are everywhere: Partnership not wages! Forward the United States of Africa! In fact, the only posters are of The Great Leader himself, resplendent in his pop-star sunglasses.

We passed Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's palace once, on our way into the city. It was a vast concrete fortress, surrounded by five concentric walls. Once, he spied on his subjects; now, however, they spy on him, by clicking on Google Earth.

We divided our stay between a villa in Mussolini's garden suburbs and a newly-beautified caravanserai. The villa, Dar Arkno, was so spotlessly modern that we could watch ourselves walking, upside down, in the marble.

It was a haven from the bustle and dust of the centre, but Tripoli is such a fabulous spectacle that we also wanted to spend time at Dar Zomeet, right on the edge of the old medina. Although it was built in 1816 as a trading post for Europeans, it seemed more like a fort than a shop.

It had a door as thick as your arm, a courtyard, stone-vaulted passages and a sort of sultan's tea shop furnished with cushions and a flat-screen TV. Our room had a bed on a giant stage, and another in an alcove up near the ceiling. To our daughter, aged three, hotels don't get better than this.

From our bathroom, I could almost reach out and touch the Arch of Marcus Aurelius. It was nice to think I was bathing in the centre of the ancient city of Oea, the heart of Roman Africa. Although the city had a few other reminders of Latin rule (columns in the walls, and pillars holding up mosques), the arch was easily the best. Each block was the size of a family car, and it all seemed to carry that singular Roman message: flash we may look but we're here to stay.

In a sense they were right. Tripolitans are the proud successors of Rome. "Look at our robes!" said one guide. "Based on the toga!" In fact, the more I saw of the Tripolitans, the more I thought I recognised the traits of ancient Rome; the flamboyant generosity; the irrepressible optimism; and the love of spectacle (especially football) and children (spoilt ours rotten).

But if Oea's a little light on artefacts, down the road it's the other way round. Sabratha and Leptis Magna were the other two members of Three-City-Land (or Tripolitania). Both were built against the fabulous backdrop of the sea, and lavished in caramel stone. Now, all that's missing are people. We found ourselves peering through empty shops and homes, and wandering around in a parliament of loos. Even the wheel ruts looked fresh in the stone, and there was still water in the pools. It was as if two great cities were just waiting for everyone to come home.

Naturally, it's all a great trick of archaeology. The original cities were rattled to bits by earthquakes in the fourth century, and were then tucked up under a massive duvet of sand. The Italians had to build a railway to carry the spoils away, although even now over 60 per cent of Leptis remains underground.

Naturally, booty like this gets everywhere. Both the Palace of Versailles and the church of St-Germain are made with Leptis pillars. But, happily, the Tripoli Museum has also taken its share of the goodies. In fact, there are 47 galleries of treasure, arranged like an ascent through Libyan history.

In the basement there are priceless treasures like Aphrodite, stolen by Goring in 1940 and returned in 1999. Higher up there's the Great Leader's battlewagon, a bright blue VW Beetle (used in the 1969 revolution), and - on the top floor - there's a glass case containing his tie and gloves.

From our caravanserai, the medina spread out like an enormous crumbling brain. Parts of it have never recovered from the war, and fig trees grow in the craters. But elsewhere, it was a dense pulsating mass of medieval activity - smithies, weavers, spicers and gold merchants.

It was hard to know what to take home from such a bewildering array: pungent rugs, crocodile products, old bayonets, giant snakeskins and ancient amphorae. In the end I settled for a Colonel Gaddafi watch (£6) which tells the time in a parallel universe several centuries removed from our own.

Among this tangle of sandy alleys, there were plenty of surprises. We found an old Turkish prison (built in 1664 to house the Christians) and an ancient British Consulate (once a nest of explorers and spies). But the biggest surprise was the food. We'd arrived in Libya with biscuits and packets of cheese. It all went untouched. In the medina alone, we feasted at Abiya's (delicate lemony squid), Athar (pots of baked fish smashed open with a hammer) and Essaa (shellfish, eaten horizontally like a Roman).

By then, our guide was worried we might think Libya was quaint. So, our last day, he took us out to the desert. The cool olive groves of the coast soon gave way to dust. An hour later, we passed the hottest place on earth (El Azizia recorded a temperature of 1360F in 1922) and, after that, we saw nothing. It was strange to think of the world ending here.

After a morning of emptiness, we came across an escarpment and a fortified granary, the Qasr Nalut. It was like a castle for hobbits, and had been in active use for the last 700 years. No wonder the Libyans have survived $60 billion worth of sanctions.

John Gimlette's most recent book, Panther Soup: A European Journey in War and Peace, is published by Hutchinson.