Oman Day 4: Last Day in Salalah

The last day of our trip in Salalah we just spent some time around town exploring the last few sites before our flight to Muscat. We went to the Souq (outdoor market) and checked out what they were selling. The man below, from Yemen, was selling frankincense, so I went ahead and bought some. Frankincense is, after all, the reason this region of the world was so popular for thousands of years. Below are huge bags of frankincense which is again, the dried sap of the frankincense tree.

This region of the world also has bees that make wild honey. I've heard, but haven't confirmed, that either Oman or Yemen has some of the best honey in the world. The man below was selling honey on the street. The section of honey on the far right is from Yemen and the other four are from Oman. We tried a few of them and I have to say the honey from Yemen is the best I've ever tasted. We bought some of this as well.

Another thing in Salalah that Chris and I loved were the fruit venders that you could find just about anywhere. In the four days we spent in Salalah we probably ate about 60 of these little bananas. They were kind of bitter sweet but incredibly good. You could also get a coconut, they would chop off the top, stick a straw in it, and drink the coconut milk. Good stuff. 20 little bananas and four coconuts cost us about 1 US dollar.

Drinking from a coconut.

Here is a picture again of the Sultan Qaboos mosque. Not to be confused with the Grand Mosque in Muscat by the same name.

The most significant religious site in the area was the tomb of the prophet Job. Muslims also believe in the prophet Job, but in Arabic, his name is Ayub (pronounced Ai - oob). To get here Chris and I took a little drive into the mountains.

Its kind of hard to see but at the top of this mountain there are two little yellow domed buildings. The biggest one is the mosque and the small one is Job's Tomb, or Nabi Ayub. Is this really the area where Job lived and died? I have no idea. We did a google search about it and apparently there are two other sites that claim to be the tomb of the prophet Job.

Above is the mosque at Nabi Ayub.

Here is the spot where Job is buried.

Afterwards we went back to Salalah and checked out the last major site, an ancient city named Al Baleed. This city is very old, perhaps as old as 2000BC if I remember correctly.

Here are some of the ruins of Al Baleed. Just like the other old cities of Oman this city was big into sea voyage and trade.

More ruins. In the picture above I'm wearing the traditional Omani....head...thing. In Palestine it has a different name, in Saudi it has a different name. I don't know what the Omanis call it. I'm wearing it because our adventures of the past few days gave me quite the sunburn and you can't really buy sunscreen anywhere. This was the next best thing.

An old toppled pillar at Al-Baleed.

The city is from 2000BC if I remember correctly, but the city continued to exist and has many old mosques from the period after the prophet Muhammad. The picture of above shows the ruins of the city's grand mosque.

More of the city.

It was about time to catch our flight to Muscat so we paid one more visit to the fruit stands before we went.

Enjoying one last coconut.

Above is Mrs. Kumar, our hotel owner. She was one of the best parts of staying at the hotel we did. She helped us with many things like finding the sites we wanted to see, getting our car, and even mailing stuff for us. So if you're ever in Salalah and you want a cheaper but nice hotel, try the Salalah beach villas. We caught our flight, and I'll write the rest later.

Oman Day 3: The Natural Harbor at Khor Rori and Other Adventures

Yesterday we drove a two and a half hour distance Eastward to get to Khor Khofot. We went about as far as we could without entering Yemen. On this day we were going Westward. The most important thing we wanted to see was Khor Rori, an ancient city and harbor. We also saw a few other things on our way. Heading down the coast we stopped at a little town called Taqa. Nothing particularly special about the town other than its a beautiful ocean side city with many fruit plantations, trees, and a little fortress that we decided to visit. Here are some views of the city from the top of the fortress.

Me standing on top of the fortress. This actually isn't that old. Maybe only one hundred years.

A view inside the fortress. This is where the governor used to live with his family and guards.

This is actually only a picture of a picture because the women in this country and other parts of the Middle East usually don't like to be photographed. I liked this picture because of the mask the woman wore. This mask is traditional for Oman. The women in this country wear a variety of colors unlike Saudi, where the women usually just stick to black.

We spent most of our day here at Khor Rori aka Sumhuram. This place was awesome. It wasn't far from Salalah, maybe 40 minutes? and only 10 minutes or less West of Taqa.

If you look closely beyond the goats drinking in the picture you will see in the distance the old city walls of Khor Rori. This city used to be an important city for ocean trading. A river feeds the ocean from this location during the Khareef season. During that time huge water falls go spilling off of the cliffs north of the city. When it is the dry season the river stops but the water still reaches the city from the ocean.

Khor Rori was the perfect place for a city because of the cliff you see in the distance and the cliff I'm standing on when I took this picture. The cliffs kept the ocean waves from pounding the shore day in and day out. This was important because you could easily take a boat into and out from the city without having to fight the waves. If you read my post from the day before you will see this was important because Chris and I almost got stranded at Khor Khofot because we could hardly get our boat past the waves. We almost lost our boat in the process!

You probably can't see the ancient city Khor Rori/Sumhuram in the picture but its basically right behind me in the distance in the picture above. You might think "how could this be a good place to take ships in and out of when there is a sandbar blocking the way!?" Well it is actually the sandbar that was the eventual destruction of the city. This city prospered from 300BC to 500AD. About 500AD this sandbar started to form making it impossible for ships to enter and get to the city. That is why the city remains in ruins today. The inhabitants probably had to abandon it when the means of its income was destroyed. But before this time it would have been the perfect place to build ships and take them out into the sea. Its also a beautiful location!

Here I am standing on one of the cliffs. It makes me wish I had a brother so I could throw him off of it (inside joke for those of you in the know).

Walking along the sandbar. Many tourists are brought to this location to swim. Chris and I were here more to explore and hike although we did go swim in the ocean later.

We walked over to the opposite side of the cliff and rested for awhile.

A view of the sandbar from the other side. Keep in mind the mountains in the back would be completely green and beautiful during the Khareef season. Water would be spilling off the mountains like crazy.

Taking some time to read one of my favorite books again.

Here are some camels drinking from the waters near Khor Rori.

You can see two white flamingos in the distance. When they flew you could see the inside of their wings were actually pink. We saw many birds here. In the Khareef there are supposed to be even more of them.

Now for exploring the city. This part of the ancient city is a temple to the god they worshipped. The god's name, ironically, was Sin. When I came back and showed my students these pictures I told them about this and what the word "sin" means in English. When I told them I could see my most conservative student nodding in agreement like he was saying "what an appropriate name" I thought it was funny.

Here I am at the altar of Sin.

Its hard to see but there is writing on this stone. This was a part of the ancient gate of Sumhuram. It describes the construction of the city.

The old well of Khor Rori/Sumhuram. It used to be located in a very large building.

Standing in the ruins of the city. You can see the two cliffs and the sandbar in the distance. We spent a good amount of time in the city and then we were off. This was one of my favorite places in the Dhofar Region. Next we headed to a little town known as Mirbat - a town needed a little bit of repair and cleaning.

Mirbat is a little fishing city. Many of the buildings here are falling apart. This city has a little fort that is basically the Alamo of Oman.

Below is a mosque in Mirbat.

Crumbling building.

Below is a little fort. I'm not sure if it is this one or the one in the next picture but in the 1970's the communists tried to take over the government here. Just a handful of men were able to hold off a small army that greatly outnumbered them from a little fort like this (maybe this one)

Or it could be the fort below with the kids playing soccer.

We drove about an hour back East to Salalah and explored the city some more. I would post more pictures but I'm trying not to flood my posts with a million pictures. I'll put a few of them on my next post. Day 2 and 3 were definitely our most adventurous days. Our trip was half over by this point....it was going way too fast.

Oman Day 2: The Search for Khor Khofot/Wadi Sayq

We began our second day with a short breakfast early in the morning and then we rented a 4WD from our hotel manager. We were looking for a place called Wadi Sayq or Khor Khofot. We had always heard the name Wadi Sayq, but the locals know the location by Khor Khofot which led to some confusion in finding the place. Wadi Sayq is a dry river bed that leads into Khor Khofot. We wanted to find this place because of how beautiful it is and it is one of the possible locations for the land Bountiful according to Mormon scholars. Most of the roads took us more inland away from the coast so we often found ourselves in the more arid parts of Oman. Even the desert can be beautiful. We headed West along one of the main roads to find this place. We really didn't know if we would find it. We were first under the impression we would have to hire a boat to take us but some others said we could just drive there and walk a little ways. These warning signs for camels are very appropriate. I think I've seen more camels in Oman in just my few days there than I have seen in 4 months of living in Saudi Arabia.
This place is called Mughsayle, a nice beach area that locals and tourists like to visit because of caves and some occasional geysers that mostly appear in the Khareef (Monsoon) season. This camel is catching a snack while a bird relaxes on its back We weren't aware when we started that our journey would take us into some high mountains and then to the bottom of some deep canyon areas. We went so far up we were driving in clouds and then so far down we were close to sea level again. This happened twice on our way to Khor Khofot. We also passed two military checkpoints along the way. The soldiers were really good to us and tried to help us with directions when we needed it (even though they weren't always correct). At the second checkpoint the soldier told us to find Khor Khofot we should turn back to go into a small town that was close to it. We asked a town's person filling up some water and he pointed the way we should go. We went in the direction the water man pointed out and it led us to a viewpoint of Khor Khofot but we were so high in the mountains we knew we could still be far from our destination. We found a soldier at the viewpoint and he told us to go in the opposite direction that the man earlier told us. At this point we had already spent a few hours on the road. It was very helpful that most Omanis speak some amount of English. Already this was turning out to be quite the adventure. So we continued on. Again we went down into a deep canyon that was under road construction and then again, we went so high up we were in the clouds again. We were close and yet so far.
Here is one of the many camels we passed on our way. This one thought it would be nice to rest on the road. Camels are surprisingly calm and never seem to mind when a car passes right next to them. They seem so calm, yet make the ugliest sound in the world. At this point we figured it would probably be impossible to drive to our location as some people had led us to believe. Our only option was to continue down the road to a little fishing village known as Dhalkut. This tiny little town is Dhalkut. It is literally just miles down the coast from Yemen. We figured the population of this town is somewhere around 400-700? Imagine living in a tiny little fishing village far away from everything and two white American guys in a 4 wheel drive show up for a visit. I don't think they get many visitors in this place. At this point we needed to fill up our gas tank. We looked for a gas station and couldn't find one. We asked some of the locals and they kept pointing in various directions. We eventually found one man who led us to some guy's house and he had small tanks of gas just sitting in his front yard. We paid him to fill up our vehicle for us. We also had a little lunch while we were there. Our next mission was to find a boat. We went to the dock area and asked around. One man told us that all the fisherman were out but that if we wanted to wait until 3:00 maybe he could find us one. That was an hour and a half away so we just explored the little town and sat on the beach and read a little. I think I may have seen more goats than people here. As we walked along the beach we found a helicopter, that we later learned was from Yemen, crashed upon the beach. Apparently it crashed into the mountains, managed to land in the ocean, and then eventually washed up on shore. I heard the people inside all survived. Reading one of my favorite books while we were waiting. A lot of sand crabs were roaming about. We waited until 2:50 and then headed back to the docks. The men were cutting up their fish to get ready to sell. They offered them to us for an enormously large price. We refused. We were lucky because one of the fisherman, a younger man, offered to take us for 45 Omani Riyals which we gladly accepted. His name was Ahmed. Here is Ahmed getting his boat ready. Right before we were about to leave the engine cut out so he borrowed his brother's boat instead (not an encouraging sign). Ahmed didn't speak a lot of English but we were all able to communicate well enough. Occasionally some Westerner's do seek out this little town for the same reason as us. They asked us if we could swim before we left. We told them we could and they said it was good because sometimes the big waves can capsize the boat...this is where I began to wonder if its a good idea to go out into the Indian Ocean with the possibility of flipping with no life jacket, our passports, our money, our car keys, etc. But when else would we have the opportunity to see this place!? On the way there Ahmed tells us that months before some Western people wanted to come here, but the boat did flip. I'm not sure if he said they made it or just turned around at that point. 30 minutes of riding the waves and we finally reached our location, Khor Khofot/Wadi Sayq. It might not look like it but that boat was rather heavy. I mention that here because of what would come later. At this point we were just happy to arrive. We weren't sure if we were going to find it. Ahmed told us he would wait on the beach while we explored. He gave us a few hours to check out the place. Khor Khofot is extremely beautiful. Its a place filled with trees and flowers. Fruits grow here all year around, and bees make honey in the cliffs during some parts of the year. They say the honey in Oman and Yemen is some of the best in the world and we would later discover that is true. As nice as the place was for Chris and me, it probably only had a tenth of the green it would have during the Khareef season. Its like a tropical paradise at that part of the year and very secluded. They had some very unusual trees here. At the end of the branches we would see flowers like this growing. This would be the perfect place to build a summer home! Perfectly secluded, quiet, surrounded by beautiful mountains. Of course you'd have the occasional fisherman, or westerner visit you from time to time. Ah, beautiful. I loved hearing the sound of the waves while in Oman. Inside the caves we found either bees or hornets nests. It would be a nice place to take shelter from rain and make honey, which the bees do at certain times of the year here. There were many pools of water like this around. A lot of wildlife comes here when they get thirsty. It had been so long since I'd seen a tree other than a palm. Nice mountains for hiking! If we could have stayed a few days we probably would have. trees. trees. more trees! This was the point where things got a little crazy. I headed back to the beach to check in with Ahmed. He told me that he'd heard we might get rain (we did see some dark clouds in the distance) and that it would be a good idea for us to get out of there. Mind you he did this mostly by signs and a few English words. So Chris and I got our final picture taken and we prepared to leave. At this point the water had receded somewhat leaving our boat a little bit more beached than was convenient. The three of us began to try and turn the boat and push it into the water. We had to wait for big enough waves for us to push the boat back into the water....it took more than a few minutes. It was difficult work, more difficult that many of my experiences as a river guide. We finally got the boat far enough into the water. But we weren't finished yet. Chris and I had to keep the boat pointed straight into the waves so we wouldn't flip. We waited for the waves to lighten up, then we pushed the boat farther into the water. Ahmed told us to quickly jump on while he kept pushing, but the waves got stronger again and pushed our boat to the right. I quickly jumped to the left side of the boat so we wouldn't flip but then the waves started pushing us into the rocks on the sea shore. This is when the worry light came on in my head. Ahmed was completely exhausted and our boat was about to be completely crushed into the rocks. We got the boat away from the rocks and started again. When we got the boat perfectly positioned again we couldn't get the motor started and the waves would push us back again. I really started to think we might be sleeping the night in this place completely secluded from civilization. Finally, one more try and we got it - the engine started for us (Hallelujah). Ahmed let out a cry of joy and we were on our way.I took a picture of him right after - look at how completely exhausted he looks. Despite his look I think he was very relieved. We made it. We got home right before dark and we had a beautiful sunset on the way. We gave Ahmed 5 extra riyals for his trouble which might not sound like a lot, but it is. He looked extremely pleased which made me happy. He probably made more money taking us on this little trip than he does after numerous days on the sea. He was a good man for helping us. When we got back someone had let the neighborhood kids know that two Americans were coming and they all came out to see us. They seemed completely in aw of us and a little shy. One kid said "what is your name?" probably the only English he knew. I told him and said "what is your name?" Good times. Here they are below. We began our drive back in the complete dark through the crazy canyons. The construction workers must have worked really fast because the roads were unrecognizable on the way back. So much so that I thought we were going the wrong way. I kept thinking "I hope we don't end up in the middle of Yemen somewhere. Luckily we got to a point we recognized and the rest of the ride was a breeze. This was by far the most adventurous day of our trip but there were many more great things to come.