My trip to Oman, the neighbouring country of the United Arab Emirates(UAE), where I'm based, began early in the morning, because it was the day of
Eid Al Adha and we were up early for prayers. Immedietely after prayers and
a quick bite, me and my two buddies started off at 8.30am. This was my first road trip crossing a countries borders, and the first long trip in my Honda Civic coupe, so it was going to be special. After setting the meter to zero, we set off on our journey.
UAE and Oman share two borders with each other. One is the Al-Hafeet border
in the Omani town of Al-Buraimi, which is right next to the UAE town of
Al-Ain. We intended to cross into Oman using this border, and exit using the
other Hatta border, and drive back to Dubai from there. The intended route
was Dubai-Al Ain-Buraimi-Ibri-Bahla-Nizwa-Muscat-Barka-Hatta-Dubai over a
period of 3days/2nights with one night planned at Nizwa and the other at
Muscat, with a few diversions here and there. I expected the total distance
to be around 1200 kms. Road travellers from Dubai to Oman normally drive the
450 kms/5 hours to Muscat on the excellent three lane, illuminated highway
and come back the same route, but with our plan, we could cover more
cities/towns apart from just Muscat, roughly covering the same distances.
We were prepared with Oman insurance(AED 100, approx USD 28) for the car and
visas(AED 30 each, approx USD 8), but at the UAE border we were also
required to pay AED 20 each for an UAE exit pass. Similarly on our return,
we also had to pay AED 20 totally while exiting Oman at Hatta. Both visas
and insurance are issued to GCC residents at the borders as well, in case
you dont have them in advance. If you take them in advance, you can save
yourself around 30 minutes to one hour at the border. Anyway, you will have
to stop and get out at the border even if you have visas to fill in the exit
forms etc. If you plan your trip well, you can consider this as a break
during the drive!
At 13.30, we entered Oman after completing all formalities. The roads in
Oman are good, but unlike in the UAE, there are lots of highways which are
dual carriageways without any dividers as such, and not all roads are
illuminated. In many cases, the roads dip up and down and can take the shape
of various curves. All this automatically forces all drivers, specially
night drivers to be extra cautious and drive very carefully. These
observations, however, do not apply to the Dubai-Muscat highway though. That
is an exception. Also, on most roads we encountered, the U-turn or other
road markings are just painted on the road, they cannot be distinguished in
any other way because there simply isnt any divider or anything else jutting
out of the road anywhere! After crossing the border, for around 250 kms
until Nizwa and another 100 odd kms from Nizwa to the outskirts of Muscat we
travelled these kind of roads.
After a quick lunch at Ibri, a small town famous for its Wednesday Souq or
Market (alas, we were there on a Tuesday!), we continued our journey, with
our next stop being Bahla. I did notice a number of car showrooms in Ibri,
of almost every famous make like Nissan, Toyota, Mazda etc. In an hour and a
half, we reached Bahla. A mysterious town - Bahla is the home of myths and
legends that have carried through the centuries. Some people today still
believe that magic is afoot in Bahla and many Omanis are superstitious when
it comes to talking about Bahla. This little town is famous for its pottery.
The old Bahla fort with its 12 km wall is the oldest fort in Oman. The fort
is believed to have been built in pre-Islamic times and is now undergoing
reconstruction sponsored by UNESCO and the site is included on UNESCO's list
of World Heritage monuments. We were thus unable to enter it but had a
brilliant time going around it, clicking pics amidst the ruins. A short
distance beyond Bahla lies the Castle of Jabreen. This massive three-storied
castle was also built during the mid 1600's. It is a fine example of Islamic
architecture with beautiful wooden inscriptions and paintings on the
ceilings.
It was slowly nearing sunset, and we had planned a few more places before
that, so we quickly made our way to our next stop, Al Hoota Cave. To get to
this place, we took a left turn on the main Bahla-Nizwa highway itself,
guided by a helpful sign board and then followed the directions on the
subsequent boards. Once you take this left from the main road, you enter
another road which after awhile gives options for a road to the cave,
another for the Al Hamra village, Wadi Ghul, Jebel Al Shams mountain and so
on. Our plan was just to try the cave before sunset and do the rest the
following morning. We were already aware that this cave also was also
undergoing renovation to make it more tourist friendly, but we wanted to
atleast try. Alas, we were unable to go in, as exciting as it sounded!
Hopefully next time we can!
As the sun set over the wonderful mountain scenary and on our first day in
Oman, we wound our way upto our night stop, Nizwa. However, there was yet
one more place on the way! Yes, it was Tanuf. Tanuf is an important Wadi in
Oman (Wadi is an Arabic word for a mountainous area which fills with water
during rains) from where a mineral water called Tanuf is produced, and we
decided to take a look. However, we took the wrong left turn on the
Bahla-Nizwa highway at the Wadi Tanuf board instead of taking the left turn
where it said Tanuf Dam (with a big board of the mineral water bottle!).
Anyhow, we finally descended into the Wadi which was right after the
bottling factory, and frankly, it was all dried up! Perhaps we could have
encountered water further on, but being in the twilight, in my little Honda
civic and with the gravel, pebbly terrain; this was not a very good idea!
Moreover, these wadis are very unpredictable, almost dangerous. One second
they maybe dry, the next minute it ight just rain heavily and water might
just flood the area!
We entered Nizwa shortly, a quaint little town which was once the capital of
Oman. It had one of everything- a beautiful mosque, a fort and a souq (all
of which were bang in the middle of the town and adjacent to each other and
had similar architecture!). It also had very few restaurants and hotels, but
enough for the towns small population, I assume. We had a light dinner, and
after a stroll along the closed Souq (which was beautifully constructed) we
decided to call it a day. It was getting late, and we had a long long day,
so we used the blankets, pillows and other stuff we had brought along to
create a comfortable bed in a park near Falaj Daris and slept away like
babies, our bodies tired, but our minds excited because tomorrow was day two
in Oman!
CONTINUED IN THE COMMENTS SECTION, SO REFILL YOUR TEA/COFFEE MUGS OR LIGHT FRESH CIGGIES OR JUST CONTINUE TO ENJOY THE READ!
