Rose water of Jebal Akhdar

Roses being stored

April 3, 2011

Always good for a road trip Leslie signed up for the Omani Heritage Gallery Tour up to Jebal Akhdar. Jebal Akhdar is about 2 1/2 hours inland from Muscat and the steep ascent up to 7,000 feet to reach the plateau requires still a hardy 4 WD with low low gear even through the road is now paved. The family had been up to the Jebal a couple of times previously before the road was paved and permission from the military was needed. As soon as the OHG notice for the trip came out Leslie contacted a few friends and had 3 other ladies joining her on the trip. Muna Richie, the director of OHG lead the group of 14 up past the military check point near Birkat al Mouz. The first village we went to on the plateau was Al Shareija. We walked through the village to a house where an older Omani man, Abdullah was making the rose water. He had a big basin of fresh fully opened rose blossoms with cool water sprinkled on them. Every morning during the rose season, which runs roughly from April to May, he is out there collecting his rose blossoms at 6 am and the again at 5 pm. He stores them in a cloth in his coolest room and freshens them with cold water as he gets ready to prepare the rose water.



Four pots for making rose water



The process of extraction of the rose oil is through condensation. A clay pot called a “Al-burmah”, or in this case 4 clay pots are sealed within a mud hearth over a fire. Abdulla used his hand to put 2 handfuls of rose petals into the pot and swish them around.  He said he does not burn his hands because of the water on the roses.  Then a smaller metal bowl is put inside on top of the rose petals to produce condensed vapor, followed by a lid and then some more water on top to cool the lid. The metal bowl on the inside then collects the condensed water as possible.  The liquid is then poured into pottery jars and aged for about 1 month before being sold.  The smoky rosewater is used for medicinal purposes and put in Omani coffee and sweets particulary halwah. Abdulla did a wonderful job of demonstrating the process and Muna acted as our translator of his descriptions and all our questions. His other job is as a Koran teacher in the school. Of course cameras were clicking away during the demonstration and the whole day.



traditional mud ovens called “Al-duhjan.”



The essence makers often labour in hot, clammy rooms simultaneously working several hearths at a time but one netted a profit of over RO1,000 in rose water sales last year - for just two months’ of hard work. As in the case of the date cultivation and harvest business, rose growers often hire out their bushes to professional essence-makers at the rate of about RO20 per bush.  Each bush yields about 15-20kg of petals during the season, while it takes about 2kg of petals to generate 750ml of essence valued at RO5. The traditional packaging is in Vimto bottles with newspaper wrapping. With the demand for Omani rose essence as strong as ever, the arithmetic works out in everyone’s favour - grower, extractor, seller and halwa-maker included.

After that we went out to see various rose farm areas and just walk around among the terraced garden areas. There are designated trekking paths through the area. As you walked through the rose garden's the smell was magnificant.

The roses of the Jebal Akhdar that are of such reknown in the area are the Mohamedean variety. I tried to get a rose bush to take home but couldn't make that happen. Muna promised she will get some for us from the supplier OHG uses for their shop. He had gone to Nizwa for the day so was not around.

We all had lunch at the Jebal Akhdar hotel.  After lunch the group split up and some headed back to Muscat but we decided to stay abit longer and explore.  We drove to Diane's point as Lady Diane had camped there over night in a visit back in the early 1980s.  The point had some lovely views and while admiring them we saw another building that we thought was a hotel.  We went and checked out the Sahab Hotel which was lovely.  An Omani gentleman showed us around the small but eco-friendly resort which had a fossil garden and lovely infinity pool.  The views at sunset would be spectacular. One of the staff took us to his Uncle's rose production site and he gave us a bag of rose petals to take home. 

Road drops steeply to the coast

Road views down to coast with Sur coastal LNG plant in distance

cars parked on Selma Plateau at 5,000 feet

David gets directions to Selma Plateau from villager

Astronomy 4WD Campout Selma Plateaum up from Qalhat, Oman

We had signed up for the PDO (Petroleum Develoment Oman) Astronomy Club outing along with our neighbor Annette who told us about the club. We met up at the Oman Oil filling station just before Quriyat on the coast road heading towards Sur at 14:30. By 15:05 27 4WD cars headed off down the coast to Qalhat (Bibi Mariam's tomb is there). The club notice had advised that this would involve steep driving up to the 5,000 feet position on the Selma Plateau halfway between Fins and Qalhat on the coast. All participants brought their own camping equipment and catering.

From Qalhat we drove up into the mountains on a well graded dirt road. The initial climb was particularly steep. Convoy rules applied so that, theoretically, you stopped if you did not see the car behind you and you tried to keep the car in front of you in sight. It was obvious that there were varying levels of experience in off- road driving from the start, with some drivers not knowing how to put their cars in low-range 4WD. We had an expensive Range Rover behind us that just crawled along, so we were always stopping and waiting for him. In stark contrast, the guy in front of us never stopped to see what happened to us.

 The group leader took a wrong turn so we ended up in a village where the road ended, and all 27 cars had to turn around. David helped out by asking the locals where the road to the Selma Plateau was; although we had several Omanis in the group,  they did not step forward to assist with getting directions. We arrived at the designated spot around 5:30 pm so all scrambled to get their tents up. Camp fires were permitted out of the line of sight of the observation area where telescopes were being set up. The group treasurer and his friend invited us, Annette and her friend Robyn, to join them at their camp fire. We all ate our prepared meals and chatted by the fire. We had been told it would get cold, but we did not really believe how cold, although we were at 5,000 feet. Prior to the lazer light show, pointing out constellations etc, we were wrapped in our small fleece blankets and using our red flashlights. Red flashights only are mandated as the source of light 30 minutes befor the program starts so all can get their night vision.

The evening observation program concentrated on deep sky objects including the Virgo/Canes Venatici/ Leo region cluster of galaxies as well as Orion area. The group had set up several big telescopes so you could see the winter sky constellations. What we enjoyed most was the laser sky tour as we know nothing about the stars! Had we been more warmly dessed we would have stayed up late to enjoy the starry night.
We had made up our usual beds to sleep in the car and took our Advil PM to help us sleep. It was very cold so we did not sleep very well. We were up having our hard boiled egg breakfast and luke-warm tea from our themos by 7 am. By 9 am we were heading back to Muscat. While we had brought snorkling gear and had discussed snorkling with Annette and Robyn, we decided to abandon that idea as we had a dinner invitation that evening and wanted to get in a nap. We stopped at Finn's beach and had a look around on the beach while we ate a snack. We very much enjoyed the Club outing and wish we had heard about it this group's monthly trips earlier.
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