From desert to beach in 24 hours - crossing Wahiba Sands
Wahiba Sands (or lately Sharqiya Sands) is a vast desert around 2 hours drive from Muscat - it is 180 km long (north-south) and 80 km wide and was named after the Bani Wahiba tribe. Bedouins (or Bedus), the nomad people of the desert still live there and tend their animals but nowadays they also have a house in Bediyah, the small town, the gateway to the desert - the last option to stock up and fill up the car if you want to cross! And exactly this is what we did - crossed the desert north-south. We did hire a guide this time - although Finn had never got stuck before, we did not want to risk anything and boy we were right.
We arrived to Bediyah the day before the crossing and stayed at a camp of a a a local family - they were super friendly, the kids were fun and the food was yum. We admired the sunset from the top of the sand dune behind the camp, enjoyed the flat bread freshly prepared by the father on the open fire and talked away with the daughters under the amazing night sky. The next morning we drunk milk tea, ate local pancake with date syrup and walked to check on the goats - the kids had a blast jumping and rolling off the dunes! Than we met our guide and the adventure begun - we drove close to 180 km across the desert to reach the sea on the other side. We did get stuck but as it turned out later it was also partly due to the fact that the tires were not deflated enough. Either way we got pulled out by our guide. We saw wells and small farms in the middle of nowhere, the only tree in the area and loads of camels. We visited our guide cute eco desert camps - there are plenty of camps here as it popular with locals and expats to visit but they are typically big and one even have a swimming pool (crazy...). His, the Bediyah Safari Tours camp is small, basic but looked very welcoming - we will try it out at some point for sure, looked like the perfect place for star gazing! We also passed by the desert school - apparently around 100 kids are driven there daily from all part of Wahiba Sands.
On the other side we were like 4.5 hours drive from Muscat so we followed the advise of our guide and checked into Saqla resort, a small hotel right on the beach. The cabins are built of stone and the view is amazing and there is a long, like many kms long of beautiful beach to stroll on. We took advantage of this since in Muscat it is not possible to go to the beach now - strictly speaking nowhere is allowed, but this hotel is far from any big city and we were basically alone. Well, except the few locals just opposite the hotel who were hunting mussels - they typically walked away with a huge bag!
Next day we drove along the cost back to Muscat - it is a really nice drive, we have done it a few times by know. This time we stopped at the pink lake - it is pink due to some algae. This time was more like rust color, but the wide life - birds mainly, flamingos and others - was super nice. And we stopped at Al Ashkharah, a small beach-town with a charming marina with plenty of dows (local fishing boats).
For a short video of how we got rescued from the sand-trap and the crossing itself scroll down!
Comments
Post a Comment