The Arab World Part 4: From Nizwa to the desert and along the coast to Muscat

In our last blog about Oman we'll take you to the sand dunes and along the coast to the capital Muscat. We cycle for many kilometers without much infrastructure, but are rewarded with impressive landscapes, beautiful campsites and encounters with dromedaries at the roadside. In the total of four weeks in Oman we cycled 1000 km and took only few break days, but we would have liked to see much more of this country. Therefore, we have added a short conclusion to our bike trip through Oman at the end of this blog.

But now back to Nizwa, where we continue our trip from the bleating goat market in the direction of the desert. On the way, we make another short stop in Ibra. In the old town, a paved path leads through an archway to a jumble of crumbling two- or three-story mud houses left to decay. Once again, we are fascinated by the traditional architecture in Oman.

But enough sightseeing, the desert is calling. Ever since I was in the Sahara for the first time and spent the night under the countless stars, I have been fascinated by the loneliness of the desert, the vastness and the astonishing tranquility. Now I get to experience this together with Dario for the first time. The area called Sharqiya Sands around the village Bidiyya is best suited for a trip into the desert, because from here the red sand dunes tower up for meters and as far as you can see there is only sand. This is how the desert looks from our imagination and it announces itself already a few kilometers before by the many dromedaries on the roadside. But not only next to the road, but also on the road we see dromedaries loaded in countless passing off-road vehicles. A funny sight, how they look in the wind in all directions. Unfortunately, such moments could not be captured on pictures, as the pick-ups were too fast for us.

Originally, we planned to fight our way off-road through the sand by bike and pitch our tent in a lonely place in the middle of the dunes. The idea of this would be very nice, but there are numerous desert camps and 4x4 jeeps in this area and it probably wouldn’t have been so easy to find a suitable and wind-protected place; but in addition, stomach problems put a spoke in our wheel and we just don't feel fit enough to push our bikes through the sand for hours. For the many months we have been on the road, we have relatively few health problems, but every now and then we drink bad water or eat something that we shouldn’t and then we suffer for a few days. I guess that's just part of it. But of course, we still want to see the desert, so we spontaneously book a night in an affordable desert camp.

The whole decision happened so spontaneously that we didn’t look long for an accommodation and were all the more surprised when we are greeted by the generous Rashid and learn that we’re the only guests in the desert camp tonight. We’ve chosen a small camp with only four tents, because the larger facilities with fences all around, air conditioning in the tent and activities such as quad driving don’t sound that appealing to us. Our tent is incredibly comfortable with real beds, a terrace and even a shower. Rashid welcomes us with tea and dates and tells us that they only opened their camp in 2019 and then had to close for two years due to the pandemic. Slowly, tourists are starting to come back to Oman and we just meet very few of them, most of them come from France.

We climb a dune and want to enjoy the sunset, but the strong wind makes the whole thing more of a sand peeling instead of a romantic experience. Nevertheless, the feeling is unique to sit on a dune and to see only sand as far as the eye can see. The sea of dunes stretches for miles in front of us and we would have never gotten that far in with our bicycles. Fortunately, it's not the weekend, because then the locals race through the dunes with their jeeps, the opposite of the silence and solitude that we are seeking in the desert.

Even though we only spent one night in the desert and the clouds disturbed the show of the stars, it was an incredible experience and we are glad we chose it. We feel a little better again and continue along lonely roads, accompanied again and again by dromedaries.

Beautiful campsite in the wadi and traditional shipbuilding in Sur

We decide not to stop at the surely worthwhile and popular Wadi Bani Khalid and instead camp a bit further away near the village of Sabt. As soon as we leave the big main road, it gets lonely and the landscape spectacular. Once again, we find a beautiful campsite in a wadi directly at the water and with a view of palm trees and rocks. It couldn't be more idyllic. In general, we find the most beautiful campsites of our journey so far in Oman and we are looking forward to the next campsite every day. From here we take the road back to the coast to Sur.

Sur was already an important trading center for trade with East Africa and Asia in pre-Islamic times. The manufacturing of vessels played an important role in the port city and even today you can visit a shipyard where dhows are built in the traditional way. We are fascinated by these ships, which are built without precise plans. Instead, the Omanis memorize the way of building ships by heart, as they have been practicing this craft and passing it to new generations for a long time. The ships used to sail to the East African Coast to Zanzibar and there was a lively exchange.

And you can even feel this influence today when you taste certain dishes in Oman that originate in Eastern Africa. But in general, we have to admit, the Omani cuisine hasn’t inspired us, as we found the dishes rather dry and monotonous. Very typical are huge amounts of rice with chicken or fish, but unfortunately without vegetables or sauce. We prefer the many Indian or Pakistani dishes that are available everywhere in the small coffee shops and restaurants. There is some wonderful Omani food, we’re sure about that, but it’s definitely found at the local’s home and not in the restaurants and we often get hungry when we cycle through a residential neighborhood and mouthwatering scents waft towards us. In general, Oman smells incredibly good and it’s also not a cliché that it’s called the land of frankincense, as we smell it in almost every village and so it’s no surprise that mostly smells and not only images come to our mind when we remember Oman.

An enchanting wadi and a beach full of puffer fish

The route along the coast to Muscat offers fantastic views, on the left side the mountains and on the right the turquoise sea and in between many encounters with donkeys and dromedaries. On the way from Sur to Muscat, the sights just line up one after the other. In the small fishing village of Tiwi there are two wadis to marvel at: Wadi Tiwi and Wadi Shab. The Wadi Shab is more easily accessible and we decide to go there. First, a small boat ride brings us to the trailhead of the wadi and then a narrow path leads us along plantations criss-crossing the wadi and over the slippery rocks. After an hour we reach a large water basin, from here we only continue through the water. We swim from pool to pool and finally reach a narrow passage that leads into a cave with a waterfall. It’s still early in the morning and there aren’t many other visitors around. It’s a wonderful experience to swim in the middle of the impressive wadi. If we had more time, we would probably visit a few more wadis, although not all of them are easily accessible with our bikes.

In the afternoon we take a walk on the stone beach of Tiwi and discover numerous puffer fish washed up on the beach. We have never seen anything like this before. One of them is still alive and we try to throw it back into the water with our water bottle, but unfortunately, we don't succeed and touching it is not an option. We ask ourselves why exactly here so many puffer fish find their miserable end and rather do without a longer bath in the sea. In general, Oman is so clean and the marine life is actually so intact that it’s almost uncomfortable for us to go into the sea, because we regularly see rays very close to the beach. On the last evening at the sea, we go swimming and a  jellyfish catches me, but fortunately it’s not a bad bite. Nevertheless, an eerie feeling to get bitten in the middle of the water.

Our second last stage of the day has another highlight in store for us: we leave the main road and take a shortcut (once again). Our way leads us for 30 km through a lonely wadi to Yiti Beach, through an impressive landscape. And we experience once again what makes cycling through Oman such a pleasure: It’s easy to get away from civilization and ride through untouched and breathtaking nature.

Unfortunately, we are less lucky with our last campsite by the sea at Yiti Beach. It’s a beautiful beach, but unfortunately easily accessible from the capital and therefore quite crowded. In the evening, however, the beach slowly empties and we fall asleep peacefully to the sound of the waves. But too early rejoiced. At 11 PM a huge Party Motorhome arrives, which stops quite close to us, although there would be many other available spots at the beach. But that’s not the end of the story: Throughout the night, more and more cars are appearing and form a circle to celebrate a private party with probably everything that’s illegal in the country. There’s a party going on the whole night and our privacy is gone. The next morning the overtired men come by and are rather rude and try to justify their behavior with the excuse, that they belong to the royal family and do this every week on a different beach. We’re tired and annoyed from this disrespectful behavior and it’s not exactly the last impression of the country we were hoping for. We were probably just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Now there is only a little way to go to Muscat and after a month in Oman we are very excited to see the urban side of this otherwise so traditional country.

Where is the city center here?

Finding the urban side in Muscat doesn’t really work out as the city doesn’t really shows itself from a particularly urban side. There are no skyscrapers and no obvious city center and the city stretches over 50 km between mountains and sea. Thus, it’s somehow not tangible for us and you can’t discover much without a taxi apart from the old quarter Mutrah. As we cycle into the city, we don’t really notice that we’re now in a capital with 1.6 million inhabitants apart from the heavier traffic. At the harbor of Mutrah we even see a sea turtle, which is calmly swimming its lanes, which we would not have expected. In general, the capital is as relaxed and traditional as the rest of the country. We stroll along the Corniche, the harbor promenade, and visit the famous souq of Mutrah with its usual stores for clothes, jewelry, spices and household goods.

Of course, a visit to the Great Sultan Qaboos Mosque is a must. The imposing mosque offers space for 20,000 worshippers and has the second largest hand-knotted Persian carpet, that took 600 women four years to weave. Although I wear long modest clothes, I am probably not yet covered enough and have to buy (no borrowing here) an additional flowered robe with matching headscarf on the spot. Slowly, we visit the spotless mosque and are impressed by the enormous size.

The rest of the time in Muscat we’re busy buying souvenirs, organizing cardboard boxes for our bicycles and doing a PCR test, which unfortunately isn’t as easy as we thought. Our flight to Switzerland leaves in the night to Saturday and when we want to do the test on Friday morning in the hospital, we learn that we will get the result only 24 hours later. We already see ourselves postponing the flight and reorganizing everything. But we have learned to stay calm in such situations, because the solution will surely come somehow. After several inquiries we were allowed to do an express PCR-test, which is 3x times more expensive and which is supposed to deliver the results within 12 hours. When we get into the big cab to the airport in the evening with our packed bikes, we still don't have the result. So, we drive by the hospital again and two hours before departure we have our negative test result in our hands. Once again everything went well. Now it's time to take a deep breath and take off.

Why Oman is the ideal cycling destination

After 30 days our tourist visa for Oman expired and we would have liked to stay longer and cycle along the coast to Salalah. There is so much we would have liked to see like the turtles at Ras al Jinz Reserve and the lonely remote beaches further south. But this is just one more reason to come back again. And for all of you who might also consider a cycling trip to Oman, here is our little conclusion after one month in the land of frankincense.

Oman is the ideal country for cyclers with varied landscapes and hospitable and helpful people. It’s probably one of the few countries where you can still experience the authentic traditional life on the Arabian Peninsula with dromedaries along the way and the scent of frankincense in the villages. One often feels like in the much too often quoted tales from 1001 nights. But all this is reality here and not made for tourists. And thus, we come to the points, why the Sultanate of Oman is an ideal cycling destination:

• We were in Oman in December and in the winter months the weather is perfect for cycling, it is not too hot and still pleasantly warm and the sea is wonderful to swim. We had temperatures around the average 26 ° degrees during the day and have completely forgotten to look at the weather forecast, because it was just always nice and dry.
• Wild camping is allowed throughout the country and you can look forward to the most beautiful campsites, whether in the mountains at the edge of a canyon, near the sand dunes, by a wadi or of course on the beach.

• You can expect roads in best condition. Okay, with the exception of the extremely steep gravel roads into the Hajar mountains.
• Although Oman is generally an expensive destination, it’s quite affordable for cyclists, as the prices in the supermarkets are low and you can eat delicious food for under EUR 5.- in the many Indian and Pakistani restaurants. The hotels on the other hand are often overpriced and not worth the price.
• Everywhere you can find dispensers with cold drinking water and therefore the purchase of plastic bottles can fortunately be avoided.
• In every small village there are laundries and you can wash your clothes regularly.
• The hygiene during the bike trip is no problem in Oman, because the many wadis and the sea offer enough opportunities to keep clean. We have never camped so much in any country as in Oman and totally enjoyed it.
• And furthermore: the online visa is easily available and issued within a few hours via the website: https://evisa.rop.gov.om. The visa can also be extended again on site.

And now the parts that are less fun

The only rather tedious thing about a bike trip through Oman is the lack of touristic infrastructure. Sometimes we were on the road for a long time until we found a restaurant and in addition, during the siesta time in the afternoon everything is closed and you have to plan accordingly the visit of a supermarket in the daily routine, if you don’t carry enough food with you.

As a woman, you should wear longer clothes and also when bathing it’s better to jump into the water in a T-shirt and shorts instead of a swimsuit. And best not to camp on the beach on weekends, unless you want to be blasted with loud music all night of course, then it’s an ideal choice.

All in all, however, we can highly recommend a trip to Oman to everyone and if you have any questions about travel planning in Oman or of course about the other countries we visited, feel free to contact us.

After more than 1.5 years on the road, we boarded a plane to Zurich on December 18 and spent seven weeks in Switzerland with family and friends. It was a special moment as we flew in only a few hours over a part of the world that we cycled through in the last 1.5 years. We arrived in Switzerland in the middle of winter and the pandemic, in a place that we know very well and at the same time look at with a traveler mindset from outside after so many intense months on the road. We have changed, we see things differently and are glad that this is only a stopover for us and not yet the end of our cycling trip, we are just not ready for that yet. We would like to continue cycling for at least another year or more. Who knows where the wind will carry us.