Sign In
Blogs from Muscat, Oman, Middle East - page 5
Advertisement
September 21st 2008
往马斯喀特的路上 从寮国回来一个星期后，我又出发了。 7月31日是回教假期，接下来的8月1号则是星期五，所以在阿联酋一共有两天的假期。和同事在假期前一天，才决定要出发到阿曼。由於才有两天的假期，当然能去的就只有阿曼的首都，马斯开特(Muscat) 而已。阿曼也是我来了阿联酋将近一年之后前往的第一个中东国家。 这次的行程没什么来得及准备，只在出发前往Lonely Planet网站找了一些资料，然后就是看看去年在KL买的UAE & Oman Insight Guide而已。之后就和两位同事约定在31号早上6点半左右驾车出发了。 早上，我们沿着前往艾茵(Al Ain)的高速公路走，其实从阿联酋到阿曼的马斯喀特有两条路可以走，除了往艾茵的方向外，另一条就是往杜拜的方向。不过若从阿布... read more
September 18th 2008
18TH SEPTEMBER We spent a relaxing day swimming and catching up with a young Swiss couple, Alexia & Roman who had been on our Nile boat. We checked out around 6.30pm to go to the airport for our next adventure, 3 days in Muscat. We were taken to the airport by a driver and a transfer guide, we were met there by an airport escort who whisked us through the check-in at breakneck speed, passing the waiting crowds. We must have only taken 5 minutes to get through airport security, our bags checked in and the paperwork filled for customs, we were very impressed. Our airport escort (miracle man) said he had contacts and most certainly must have because when we arrived we thought we would have hours to check in. We both agreed we had ... read more
August 20th 2008
Oman was an amazing break from India. It was clean, sunny, mosquito free... and did I mention clean? This country is the best kept secret of the middle east, hands down. The streets were lined with amazing white mansions, that belong to ordinary middle class families, and streets with beautiful new cars. Most of the men are in white traditional wear with a small cap, and the women in long black jackets and black scarves on their head. As soon as we stepped out of the airport the heat hit us. About 35*C at 11:00 at night. Nice. Our friend Salim picked us up and we stopped for some Turkish food! Dale developed a bit of an addiction to Mediterranean food while we were there! Salim has a great apartment about 5 minutes from the airport, ... read more
July 19th 2008
Dave’s week-end was such a catalogue of mishaps (to be polite) that I may as well go through them in chronological order…….. 1 - There is now irrefutable proof that the speed cameras in Oman work !!! Driving down from Sohar towards Muscat with the sexy Swedish number Dave spends all his time lavishing attention on, Dave triggered a camera at c. 160kmh (ahem !!) 2 - After the first dive on Friday the people on the boat were treated to a glorious surround sound experience of Dave emptying the contents of his stomach into the Arabian Sea - there was a significant swell and unfortunately baots appear not to be Dave’s strong point !! 3 - About 10 minutes later, possibly the most comical moment of all occurred when Dave was making another bee-line ... read more
July 18th 2008
“ In a departure from usual reporting procedures, this last week-end’s diving is going to be a bit of an epic split into two blogs - one will be full of marine life and eloquence unbounded, the other will detail Dave’s dive trip which bore a remarkable similarity to “Coco the Clown gets on a boat” I was in Oman again for a meeting, so Dave drove over for the second time that week so we could go diving at the Daminiyat Islands - apparently a marine reserve because of the outstanding natural beauty of the place. It was certainly very nice but whether it stands out from other places on the coast to warrant such special status is, in my humble opinion, dubious. The dive operation was absolutely superb; slick, efficient, good quality gear, nice ... read more
Advertisement
June 26th 2008
Chelle had to go to Muscat for work late last week so she managed to convince her lovely boy to drive over on the weekend and come to make some bubbles with her. I flew to Muscat on Monday night and then worked there on Tuesday and Wednesday meeting clients and doing some training. Muscat runs a slightly different weekend system than Dubai. They have their weekends on Thursday and Friday.So I had booked us a couple of days diving for the Thursday and Friday at the Oman Diving centre. This is a diving centre that is a little way out of town, near the Shangri-La hotel. It looked quite nice from the outside but we were a little put off by the attitude of some of the staff. They were german and everything had to ... read more
May 19th 2008
so got back from 27 days at sea for 2 days in Muskat, was able to catchup on a few things, spent yesterday checking out Nizwa , the fort and the souk , then headed into the mountains to visit a small village, live is very different in Oman and the history of this place is facinating, to many photo's to upload for now, but will update the blog again when I return from sea (mid june). The Taxi's just arrived to take us to the wharf, so best be off to do some more fishing!!!! ... read more
April 29th 2008
Oman is the land of Forts. Many forts adorn the whole country. We visited a handful ourselves. My favorite: Nakhl Fort. Built into the side of the mountain...the building's elevation rises and falls with the topography of the mountain. Great design skill.... read more
April 28th 2008
Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque The Mosque is built from 300,000 tonnes of Indian sandstone. The total capacity of the mosque (interior and courtyard) is up to 20,000 worshippers. What to do with too much money? You hire indentured (modern-day slave) labor from India and flaunt the wealth by building a monument to God....ahem. And the monument happens to have a couple of record breakers (Largest Handwoven carpet and Largest chandelier in the world): The world's largest hand-woven carpet: A major feature of the design of the interior is the prayer carpet which covers the floor of the prayer hall. It contains, 1,700 million knots, weighs 21 tonnes and took four years to produce. It is the largest single piece carpet in the world. It covers the entire floor of the main praying hall of the Sultan ... read more
April 26th 2008
So have almost been at sea a week, completed a number of trawls , a huge range of exciting marine life to sample and sort, as we get closer to the Yemem boarder, more and more unlit fishing boats appear on the radar - so far no fishing boats have thrown rocks at us or opened fire on us - the closest has been a bunch shaking there fists and screening some arabic at the top of there lungs. The crew are all great to work with - nothings a problem, all the routines on the trawl deck , foredeck go like clockwork, which makes life so much easier, it's a little cooler at sea, a mild 29 degress most nights and on the clear days upto 38 degrees , quite cloudy today, but can see ... read more
