We had a long weekend last week courtesy of the UAE National Day celebrations (the country was formed in 1971), so off we went to Oman to visit our Kiwi / Aussie friends, Jill and Alan, and bash some wadis. FYI – a wadi is a dry river bed and bashing is a British expression meaning to go and explore something. Anyway, we had a grand time and saw some very interesting things.

Here is a map.

A highlight of the trip was a very strange little village ‘glued’ to the sedimentary strata of a cliff face.

We had to twist and turn our way up to the Sayq plateau (~2400 Meters altitude), cross the plateau, and descend a hair-pin-turn-twisting, crumbling dirt goat track down the other side to find this very unusual, and still occupied village. We could hear the kids running around, probably yelling at us to come over for tea. From where I took this picture, there was still a significant valley between us, and so we were not quite up to the challenge.

Also, on the Sayq Plateau, at around 2300 meters (6900 feet), this view is of some villages that practice terraced farming. How they managed to build this terraces on the face of the cliffs and then get water to them is a question that doesn’t bear thinking about. They must have taken generations to create the terraces and then actually bring dirt to them.

We also stopped in Nizwa to check out the goats at the Friday market. We encountered a group of young men admiring each others’ guns and the little ‘kid’ in the young man’s arms

While at the market, we also checked out the local pottery, but unfortunately Nizwa is only about 5 hours from Dubai and the tourists have driven the prices up and up since our last visit here about 3 years ago.

Annette saw a very nice date tray made out of palm fronds and goat skin. But the guy wanted far too much for it and was not willing to budge on the price. He knew that someone would come along and pay the price sooner or later.

We also did some wonderful wadi bashing at Al Ayn (not Al Ain, which is in the UAE) and Wadi Dahm, where we saw burial tombs from the 3rd millenium BC. To see these you must open the slide show and have a look.