2001 February Trip - The Sultanate of Oman

Getting to Oman (25 Feb)

I finally found the transfer desk. A pretty young lady from the Emirates looked over my tickets.

"This flight has been cancelled."

"Sorry?" The Egypt Air staff in Cairo had told me the flight was almost full.

"When did you get this ticket?" She was surprised that it had been issued only the day before.

Apparently the Egypt Air computers, or the staff, were completely wrong. The connecting flight hadn't been running for months. The lady at the transfer desk was not deterred.

"We'll get you on another flight."

They put me on the flight that I had originally found online. I had to run down to the gate, where they were finishing boarding. An hour later I found myself in Muscat, three hours ahead of schedule. My backpack hadn't made the connection, it would arrive on a later flight.

After all of our worrying about the visa, it turns out that two-week visitor's visas are very common. I could have just taken my original flight as planned, although food poisoning would have prevented me from making the flight anyway.

I called my father and read "Darwin Among the Machines" in the garden outside the airport while I waited.

In Oman (25 Feb)

Oman was far different from the other countries I had visited. For one thing, it was far richer (on a per-capita basis). The airport was small but clean. The highway was in good condition, and we were surrounded by modern cars.

The biggest difference, however, was that I was staying with family. It was a nice break after three weeks of travelling. I had a free room to stay in, and my father and stepmother drove me around in their large, comfortable SUV. I had home-cooked meals, the first in almost a month.

Staying with family also insulated me from the country. I talked to very few Omanis in the week I was there. I had less control over my schedule, and that was the hardest adjustment to make.

Qurayat and the Wadi Dayqua (26 Feb)

The next day we drove down to Qurayat. We crossed the Tropic of Cancer, although I didn't see any signs for it. The main attraction wasn't the town, but a wadi (dry creekbed) just before the town, Wadi Dayqua. We pulled off the paved road, and on to a dirt track that led us to the wadi, up into the mountains. We finally reached the end of the track, where a low rock dam had been constructed across the wadi. From there a falaj (narrow irrigation canal) wound its way down through the wadi.

At the end of the Wadi Dayqua.

We stopped and walked along the falaj to the dam. Then we drove back down the wadi and stopped to have lunch in a shady spot.

Walking along the falaj.

Poser.

Driving back to Qurayat.

From there, we drove into Qurayat. It's a small town on the coast, south-east from Muscat. The book mentioned that there was a small tower you could only reach at low tide, and sure enough it was low tide and a small strip of wet sand ran to the tower. I walked out, but the island was covered with sharp barnacles. I walked in the water, just so I could say I had been in the Gulf of Oman, then we headed back to Muscat.

Rosemary and my father at Qurayat.

The next two days, the 27th and 28th, we just hung out in Muscat. My father had some classes to teach. I could have taken the truck and ventured out, but I was happy to relax a bit. In the evenings we would head into Muscat and visit the various Souqs.

The clock tower at Sultan Qaboos University.

Nizwa and Environs (1 Mar)

On the 1st we decided to venture down to Nizwa and environs. Again we crossed the Tropic of Cancer.

We drove through Nizwa, to the town of Tanuf. In the late 50's this had been a hotbed of insurrection, and the sultan at the time had been forced to bomb the village. The ruins of the village still stand, and they were a bit eerie to walk through. They looked older than they were (because they were built in the tradition of much older mud houses), but a generation ago it was a functioning village.

Walking along the falaj in Tanuf.

Walking through the Tanuf ruins.

We drove up the wadi behind Tanuf, through a narrowing ravine, until we reached the end of the road, or at least got as far as one can go in a vehicle.

The end of the wadi behing Tanuf.

Then we drove down to Bahla, further down the road from Tanuf. We were looking for its famed pottery shops. We finally found them, hidden back behind the village among the falaj-fed oasis. Unfortunately, it was after 12, so all of the shops were closed until 4.

Then it was on to Jabrin. There was a fort, recently restored, and it was mentioned in my guidebook as being one of the best in Oman. Jabrin was singularly unimpressive. In fact, it wasn't even obvious that it was a village. We saw no shops, just a few houses set back from the road.

The fort was there, sitting by itself in the middle of a vast plain. Two bored Omanis perked up at our arrival, sold us some tickets, then went back to sleep. In spite of its isolation, there were a fair number of tourists there, the most I'd seen at any Oman attraction.

In the watchtower.

Looking out onto the plains of Jabrin.

The fort lived up to its billing. It was larger on the inside than one expected, with a lot of surprise staircases and terraces. We finally managed to explore all of the rooms, which took a fair amount of time. It was not a musty ruin, it was a large airy palace which had been converted only late in its life to be a fortress. The ceilings were high, and light streamed in from the open windows. Many of the rooms were furnished with carpets, pottery, baskets, and other relics of its previous occupants.

Looking down one of the main courtyards.

In a storeroom.

At the top.

We poked around for a while, then went outside and ate lunch beneath a large tree in the shadow of the fortress. It was early March, and the sun was merciless.

From Jabrin we hopped in the car, and drove back. We gave some German tourists a lift, they were going to walk the 5 km to Bahla, but that was insane in the hot sun.

We turned off and drove towards the town of Al Haram, looking for the Hoti Caves. Those caves are actually an underground wadi, where streams have carved their way beneath the hills. There are bats and a species of blind fish. We didn't have the gear necessary for spelunking, so we were going to content ourselves with just finding the cave entrance.

At the wrong ravine.

Walking across the broken ground beyond the ravine.

Here the directions given in the books were either incredibly vague, contradictory, or both. After several wrong turns, we finally found the entrance to the cave. It was somewhat anticlimatic, but driving around in the ravines had been worth it.

Camels.

After looking at the entrance to the cave we drove down to Al Haram, looked at some of their old mud buildings, and then drove back to Muscat.

Wadi Bani Awf (2 Mar)

The next day my father and I decided to tackle Wadi Bani Awf, a large wadi on the other side of the mountains from Nizwa and Bahla. We had several books on wadis (my guidebook as well as numerous other Oman books), all of them gave this wadi high marks, and we could see why. The first part of the trip was around 15 km of driving up a the wadi on relatively flat ground, much like other wadis we'd seen. The last several km were very steep, hugging the sheer mountain walls. Below us, we could see where the wadis had cut deep into the slopes.

We got out of the truck and walked for about a half an hour into one canyon, a deep ravine in the rock. We scrambled over (and under) boulders for most of the way, until our path was finally blocked by several pools of water.

In a ravine. For a sense of scale, my father is at the bottom of the picture.

A snake sunning itself beside one of the pools. I didn't try to pet it.

Continuing up the wadi, we reached the first town: Bilat Sayt. It was a very pretty village, perched on steep slopes with all of the flat area devoted to green terraces where they grew crops. After a short stop we backtracked a short distance, then took a different turning to the town of Hat, which was just a few houses perched in a small oasis along a falaj. We continued until the road ended in another village.

The terraces and buildings of Bilat Sayt.

The canyon walls beyond the town.

We drove back and had a late lunch beneath a waterfall. I say "waterfall," I'm sure after it rains it's a waterfall, but while we were there it was just a dripping ravine. Even so, it was lush with plant life, bright green ferns hanging in the shade of the canyon walls.

Then we drove back to Muscat. I think I slept most of the way.

That night we ate at the Al Bustan Palace Hotel, a gorgeous hotel just outside of Muscat. We sat on the patio in the cool night air.

Around Muscat (3 Mar)

On the 3rd we left early to visit the souq at Mutrah (a suburb of Muscat). It was supposed to be one of the finest souqs in Arabia. It reminded me of the medinas of Tunis and Sfax. Here the souq was cleaner, the people friendlier (or at least less pushy), and so it was far more enjoyable to wander around. I almost broke down and bought several awkwardly heavy brass ornaments (old telescopes, compasses, and astrolabes), but decided against it.

Along the Mutrah waterfront.

From the souq we drove up along the coast past Muscat and the Al Bustan hotel, to a small municipal beach and the local diving club. The sea (the Gulf of Oman) was beautiful, but the sun was so hot it was uncomfortable to stay outside very long.

We had lunch at a cafe in Muscat, then drove by the various embassies on our way home. We returned to that same area of town that night for dinner at the aptly- named "Lebanese Restaurant."

Leaving Oman (4 Mar)

Sunday morning I relaxed at the house. I took a final walk through the grounds of Sultan Qaboos University. It was deserted for Eid Mubarak, the festival. Millions of pilgrims were on there way to Mecca for the Hajj, and tens of millions of sheep were having a far less enjoyable time.

I wrote some postcards in the shade, and walked back to the house, the sun beating down hard upon me. I knew it would be a long time before I found sunlight this strong again, probably not even in the summer in Seattle.

My flight left at 10pm, depositing me in Dubai at 11. The next leg of the journey, to Istanbul, didn't leave until 4:30 am. I finally checked in at the Transfer Desk at around 2 am. The young lady at the desk decided something wasn't right. She looked at my original ticket, the new reservation, and frowned.

"You can't take this flight. Your ticket is restricted, no changes. Your new seat is business class, the old ticket was economy. And it's expired." Sure enough, it declared it was only good from the 28th of February until the 28th of February. I explained to her that I had called Turkish airlines, faxed them the details, and received a new ticket from them. They had bumped me up to business class because changing the travel date had taken them a long time.

"No, it's not possible. You have to buy a new ticket."

Uh-huh. After a few more rounds of this, we finally had a chat with the manager of the transfer desk. He pointed out that the ticket didn't expire until February of 2002, which seemed to satisfy the young lady.

"Oh, it's okay."

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