A Most Excellent Omani Adventure!

Frequent readers of the Desert Diaries will know how much we LOVE Oman, and with a free weekend in his itinerary what better an opportunity to introduce Uncle Stu to our favourite place!

Conveniently enough, we managed to coincide our weekend with Eric’s work commitments in Muscat, allowing us a couple of extra days. So off we headed direct to our home away from home in Qantab, a quaint little fisherman’s village south of Muscat, 5 hours drive from home.

We had read about a tropical cyclone brewing in the Arabian Sea and fast approaching the coast of southern Oman, but we were not prepared to witness its impressive strength as far north as Muscat… Incredibly high tides and unbelievably powerful waves had flooded the coast road at Qantab Beach and distributed a generous collection of rocks, wood and other assorted debris across the seafront. Locals were out in their scores, with young men relishing the opportunity to pit their strength against the mighty waves (the sea here is normally as flat as a pancake), and families out on the beach, many just to stand and stare at the spectacle unfolding in their usually sleepy little village.

The sound of crashing waves was certainly some way to drift to off to sleep that’s for sure! And the receding tide of the following morning provided a fantastic opportunity for beach combing…

No visit to Muscat would be complete however without an evening visit to the famous Muttrah Souq, and once again my favourite happy place did not disappoint!

Taking a lead from the little guy, it wasn’t long before we were suited up in full Omani attire…

…and fully schooled up on the world of Omani frankincense, Sudanese sandalwood, bakhoor and oud. We certainly left that place looking and smelling a treat!

We splurged on my now new favourite implement – a portable frankincense burner, which definitely proved its worth after travelling long hours in an FJ Cruiser full of boys 😉

By the next day Mother Nature had spewed her worst and we rose to a beautiful blue sky day – perfect for a round of sand castle building and wave jumping. The colours of the sea were incredible.

But our time in Qantab was up and the lure of the dunes was calling…

Leaving the coast we drove as far inland as the setting sun would allow and set up camp for the night.

How wonderful to be woken by the sun reaching over the craggy hills and the gentle bleating of goats with their snouts snuffling in the remains of our camp fire.

Congratulations to old Blackie here who persevered long enough to be rewarded with with a discarded nutrigrain, fallen over the side of Rem’s breakfast bowl. I bet his day was full of Ironman goodness!!

From the mountainous plains we headed deeper into the low lying acaia scrub of the hinterland. Every kilometre eliciting yet another wow moment, particularly for the sheer scale of these gorgeous rugged mountains…

…and also for the absolute deliciousness of our Afghani late lunch…

Back on the road it wasn’t long before we turned off the lonely road, passed through an inquisitive group of camels grazing in the flat sandy land and reached our destination for the afternoon… the dunes.

The Starfish Dunes to be precise… holy moly… so red, so perfect, with not another soul around, not even a footprint. The silence was deafening!

Our afternoon was spent racing to the top of the highest dune…

…kite flying…

…and toasting the glowing remains of the setting desert sun. Absolutely stunning.

We woke once again to the call of nature, this time to the throaty roar from a family of curious camels.

It wasn’t long before their curiosity got the better of them and over the next fifteen minutes proceeded to saunter right up to us.

Perhaps they didn’t recognise the Kiwi flag flying proudly atop the FJ, or perhaps we were simply in their path. Either way they certainly weren’t hungry, refusing various offers of tomatoes, cucumbers and bananas.