Visiting Oman

Khasab

Khasab is the first of three stops that we will be making in Oman. We arrived in the early morning to this small town with a port surrounded by craggy mountains.  This area of Oman is referred to as the “Norway of Arabia” because of the mountains and many fjords.

We did not take any organized tours of the area, but did take the shuttle bus into the downtown area.  

 

Town Mosque

 

Goats at lunch time

 

Playing dominoes

 This was a very small shopping area, and we were very excited to find a paint supply store where we could replenish our supply of masking tape for our art classes.  And, yes, Gail did buy another outfit; a black and gold Arabic gown with matching scarf.  She can now go “native” whenever she needs to.

"Native" Gail

We set sail for Muscat, some 500 km away at 3 PM and will be there tomorrow morning.

 

Muscat

We sailed into Muscat, the capital of Oman, at 8:30 Wednesday morning.  This is a very attractive city of some 740,000 people, surrounded by hills and several old forts. This area has been an important trading port between the west and east since early in the first century.

Entering the Muiscat harbour

 

Old fortress overlooking the city

Before 1970 there were very few schools, no education for girls, one hospital and 10 km of paved road.  Then the present Sultan Qaboos bin Said took over for his father.  Now the area has been built up into a modern city with education being compulsory for everyone up until the age of 18, many modern hospitals and clinics, a very modern road system while still maintaining classic Arabic architecture ... high rises are not permitted here.

Typical homes

We both went on an organized tour of the area today.  Our tour started at the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque, the second largest mosque in the world.  After removing our shoes, and the ladies making sure they were covered and wearing scarves, we got to enter this magnificent building. We were taken to the women’s prayer room, large enough to hold 700 women, and the very ornate men’s prayer room which could hold 6,000 devotees. 

 

Inside the men's prayer room

 For example, the Swarovsky and gold chandelier weighs 8 tonnes and can hold up to four people inside as they change the bulbs and dust.

 

 We also got to see the ablution rooms where penitents wash themselves before they enter the mosque to pray.  The ladies in our group got quite a surprise when they went to the rest room and found holes in the floor as “toilets”, with nothing to hold on to.  Those Muslim women must be really flexible.

Our next stop was a visit to the Muttrah Souk, a unique shopping area with narrow alleys and stores crammed in together.  

 

Typical shoppers at the souk

 We did purchase a couple of pashminas and a long white robe and hat for John.  

 

Cool hat ... eh?

 Should be fun to wear in Florida anyway. The tour then took us to the privately owned Bait Adam Museum, a museum inside a private home. 

 

Museum model of Bedouin settlement

Finally, we stopped off at one of seven Sultan’s palaces, the one he uses to welcome important visitors to the country.  What a beautiful estate ... this is how the 0.1 % live.

 

In front of one of the Sultan's palaces

 

Salalah

 

At the Salalah harbour

We arrived to this desert area at noon and it is very hot outside.  The  town of Salalah

Is 25 km distant and the local taxi unions will not allow the ship to run a shuttle service

back and forth to the town.  We have been told that return fare will be more than we are

willing to spend just for the privilege of doing more shopping, so we’ve decided to stay on

board and rest up and enjoy the facilities. A gentleman we had lunch with, who had

been a middle east reporter for a British newspaper said, with regards to Salalah, that

once you’ve seen one of these towns you’ve seen them all, so we do not feel that we

are missing much.

According to our map, we will be leaving here at midnight and heading out into the

Arabian sea once again sailing past the coast of Yemen.  We will then head into the

Gulf of Aden passing Somalia and then into the Red Sea. All of this sailing will take us

four sea days until our next stop at Safaga, Egypt (April 17) which is the gateway to

Luxor.