Cafés in Raouché & Manara

Café Rawda, off the corniche road

Rawda is reached by a side turning off the Manara corniche road, away from the traffic noise. Its decor is plain: wooden tables and chairs on the western side of a garden set around an old fountain.²

Families come to eat and pass the time, while writers, artists and journalists come almost daily to write, trade news, play backgammon or smoke argileh (the water pipe).² The Chatila family, who own it, have turned down investors who wanted the site, though in 2025 they would not rule out a sale.² In its heyday it received stars such as Abdel Halim Hafez, Warda and Nour El-Sherif, and the writer Ziad Kaj traces its history in his book Maqha al-Rawda, published by Dar Nelson.²

Al Falamanki and Chatila Street

Al Falamanki (الفلمنكي) opened its second Beirut branch by the Raouché rocks in June 2017, with a terrace over the view; the first, opened in 2008, had a garden for 600 people.³ The owners pitch it as a village in the city, with cards, backgammon, Fairuz in the background and manakish (flatbreads) from the oven.⁴ On Chatila Street it opens daily 09:00–03:30.

Also on Chatila Street is قهوة صغيرة (Petit Café). On Raouché Street, cafe lucy at No. 123 never closes and has Wi-Fi, air conditioning and outdoor seats.

The Ras Beirut end of the corniche

Farther north, where the corniche bends toward Ras Beirut, Kahwat Ras Beirut, Funjan Qahwa, Palace Cafe and You. sit within a few hundred meters of each other. Kalei Coffee Co. has a Ras Beirut branch with courtyard seating, much calmer than its Mar Mikhael house, and Starbucks has branches nearby.⁵

In 2001 the corniche's 76 cement benches were replaced with benches faced in colored ceramic by the artist Lena Kelekian, who also designed a giant chessboard on the widest stretch of sidewalk, on Avenue de Paris.⁶

Wind, walkers and the evening

The corniche grew out of the Avenue des Français, built along the seafront under the French Mandate.⁶ Today it draws walkers, joggers and cyclists, and some of its palm trunks are still pocked with bullet holes from the civil war.⁶ In the afternoon and evening the prevailing wind blows in from the Mediterranean, and at night it reverses and blows out to sea.⁷