Nov. 18 Dibba to Khasab, Musandam - Oman

Nov. 18 Dibba to Khasab (Oman)




We rose at dawn and backtracked into Dibba to see what we had missed travelling through at night. Picked up gas and Indian breakfast of eggs and parotas, and some directions to Musandam, which were not the most precise. After seeing the local Golden Tulip Hotel, which was full, we found that we were in the Oman part of Dhiba, which is also shared by two other states, Fujairah and Sharja. We passed a checkpoint and headed to the north and started up a mountain trail which lead to the Zigy Bay Resort, quite an expensive place that would not let us in for a coffee and a look, saying they were too full due to the ‘Id. We drove up the start of a wadi track on graded rock with wadi walls sometimes covered with plants like “hanging gardens”. After half an hour of not seeing any other vehicle, but good scenery and birds, we met a hired tourist vehicle with a local driver coming the other way. When we asked how far to Khasab, they said a few hours, but that only Omanis could pass the check point about half an hour up the road, so we would have to return to Dibba and go on another roundabout road for several hours to Sharja and Ras al-Khaimah and then to Khasab from the west. They said the rules had changed in the last few years, as before foreigners could also travel on our proposed route forward.



We decided we were fairly close so might as well see if we could get through with David’s Arabic. We climbed to 1100 meters (about 3,500 feet) on a winding track, then came down to 350 meters altitude into a large wadi with a small police (Wadi Bih) checkpoint closing the road. David got out and talked to the young officer who had come out of the adjacent building, who explained that he would like to let us in but that we were entering Oman from the UAE and had not passed a border post to check out of the UAE officially, so he could not allow it. We explained we had Omani parents (the Bosch elders) and that we just wanted to go to see Khasab and come back. He said perhaps as a favor he could let us in, but we would have to come back through the same checkpoint. After some discussion with his superior, it was agreed we would leave our passports with him and return in two days to pick them up. We had spent about 20 minutes at the remote post, and not a single vehicle had come into sight during that time.



We drove a few miles down the wadi and came upon an Islamic graveyard with very tall narrow stone markers, unlike anything seen elsewhere in Oman, as well as a circular stone structure like the base of an 'Um an Nar tomb, and a rectangular building with very large stones. We also saw come large cairns, and made a side trip to the Rowdah Bowl, a flat fertile valley a few kilometers away.

Then we climbed up a steep track with switchbacks to get the ridge of the mountain, at 3,300 feet, and drove along the ridge for several miles with huge mountains and wadis on all sides. Climbing again up steep swithbacks to over 5,000 feet, we passed below the highest peak in Musandam, Jebel Harim at almost 7,000 feet. We passed walled cultivated villages, mostly deserted, in extremely isolated positions on the surrounding slopes.



We then descended to about 3,000 feet, to a fertile flat plateau called Sayh Plateau, about a mile long and half a mile wide. It looked to have roughly 100 inhabitants. Then we went down a steep section again to reach the wadi floor at about 1,000 feet altitude, and proceeded several miles till we ran into tarmac and a checkpoint for entry to Khasab. We went straight to the Khasab Hotel, which had a modest but sizable room for $130 including breakfast, and took it. There were many local families celebrating ‘Id there, and cooking outside their rooms, which worried us a bit, but the night turned out to be quiet. It was nice to sleep in a bed in an air conditioned room!



We drove down the coast, saw the Golden Tulip Hotel, which was full, but we decided to splurge and had their dinner buffet, which was quite good, $50 each with wine. A room with breakfast was available the following day, as many people were leaving to return to the Emirates to work, but we decided that the $300 per night cost was not worth moving from our modest quarters.