The first few weeks are always difficult after coming back from holidays - we need to find our rhythm sure, but we also have to adjust back to the weather. We somehow found this challenging this year - first few weeks of September were still very hot and humid. None of us was up to any hiking but we still wanted to do something - this is how we decided to visit the Bimmah sinkhole. And as it turned out we managed to pull off quite an enjoyable day! A great and easy one-day trip from Muscat offering almost like a taster menu, a little bit of everything the country can offer.
Bimmah is one of the most popular sites in Oman - we tried several times to visit but it had been closed due to the pandemic (you can read about one of our attempts here). Bimmah usually makes it to the "top places to visit in Oman" lists of most travel bloggers’ lists and it is easy to understand why: it is pretty and convenient to approach as it is in the middle of a park. But this is exactly where it fails - you park, you walk up to it and there it is. No struggle over boulders, getting lost in a wadi and certainly no being alone. It is busy - and can get super busy. We were lucky, guess due to the heat there were only a few other visitors so we did go into the water and crossed our fingers that all the young guys who jumped - sometimes from the park level -would land successfully. They did and we saw some really impressive jumps!
The sinkhole certainly gives a good impression of what Oman has hidden in its wadis and mountains - for anyone not fancying hiking or with a young kid it is a great alternative to get a glimpse of Oma’s natural wonders!
Location for parking: 23.0368,59.0701 Very short walk from the carpark, salon car, toddler and summer friendly.
Bimmah update 2022 November - covid is clearly over.. People are everywhere...
Even this short walk overheated us big time so we headed to the beach - our favorite spot is the hidden beach (
23.000, 59.1219). You have to get off the main road and do a bit of off-roading and probably a bit of walking to get there. There are plenty of other small bays along the rod to explore. This one is very pretty but unfortunately suffers from the usual trash issue - will never understand why people cannot take their trash with themselves. But if you can overlook it (or even better, pick it up) you will have some fantastic beach time, jumping waves! Be careful though, the pull of the water is very strong, we never venture too far in.
Our next stop was Dayqah Dam - an other site which had been closed due to the pandemic. Frankly, I did not have high expectations - after all it is a dam, right? But Finn really wanted to see and we were totally surprised how beautiful and interesting it was! The drive to the dam from Bimmah was already pretty enough - through a wadi with nice views and friendly donkeys.
The dam looked commanding from the distance but once we first set eyes on the lake behind the dam we were blown away! Quite literally since it was very windy :). The dam is an impressive structure and it has a nice park with stunning views - a superb picnic point. There is an exhibition as well but unfortunately it was not open.
Dayqah Update 2022 November: Husaak adventure opened an office and it is possible to rent kayaks, small boats. Seems there are hiking routes as well, but did not ask for details. Either way it seems, it is pretty much possible to spend an activity filled full day at the dam!
From the dam we headed back to Muscat but Finn did not want to drive on the highway so we took a shortcut - these do not always work out cause a few times we did have to turn around as the road was not there or was closed, but this time we were lucky. The road was freshly scraped and it was a very enjoyable easy off-road driving offering nice scenery. The turning point is at 23.3624,58.6655 - it is not quite obvious that there is a road there and it took some try and error before we found the good scraped track but once on it, it was a fun drive. Highly recommended!
Here is the overview of our trip in case you got inspired!
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