Monday was the day from hell. We left the hotel at 7.20am for the 10 minute drive to the airport, ludicrously early for a 9.25 flight but tour companies like to get you there early. We were eventually allowed to check in and were led up to a first floor waiting room. After an hour an official came to tell us the plane was delayed. ‘Inshallah maybe one hour, maybe two, but maybe cancelled’. An oil rig engineer on the same flight was in touch with friends who were supposed to be flying to Khasab from Muscat on the plane we would then take. They had taken off then landed again after the pilot was told the wind was too strong to land in Khasab. It’s a small airport, mostly military, surrounded by mountains, with a ... read more

The Musandam peninsula is strategically important as it dominates the Straits of Hormuz, which at the narrowest point means that Oman and Iran are 21 nautical miles apart. The Musandam peninsula is almost all mountains, and we certainly experienced that today with a 4WD trip up to 1600m at the very north of the peninsula. The day started more pedestrianly, with a visit to Khasab castle. This was built as a fort by the Portuguese in the 17th century, and was subsequently taken over by the British, but it has been completely rebuilt and turned into a museum. It’s small, but interesting enough – or at least, it would have been if we hadn’t experienced a second day of long power outages. It’s hard to see the exhibits in a museum with no windows and no ... read more

Thursday was our longest lie in for a week – we only had to be up in time for breakfast at 8.00am. We set off with Connor and our friends from the previous night for a boat trip in the St Lucia estuary. Further towards the sea there are lots of boats, but the lodge has sole rights to the water further inland. The boat was a small catamaran with an engine, designed for shallow waters. It was piloted by Warwick, a delightful and very knowledgeable chap of 84. He was recently widowed and taking people out on boat trips gave him the opportunity to meet new people. We saw plenty of hippos, but sadly none of them wanted to come out of the water, so all we saw were groups of bobbing eyes and ears, ... read more

Our last morning in Manyoni. It was another of those game drives where, as time goes by, you resign yourself to not seeing anything very exciting. Nonetheless it was warmer and the early morning light made for beautiful views. Suddenly Graeme’s radio crackled into life. A lion had been sighted. We turned round and set off in pursuit. When we got there, another jeep was just pulling away. We drove into the bush to get as close as possible, but the lion was still mostly obscured by grass even though he was less than 10 feet away. He was not about to get up, as he had killed a warthog and was noisily consuming it. As it’s a smaller creature, he was crunching straight through the bones. What looked like a rack of raw pork spare ... read more

In the words of the Dinah Washington song, what a difference a day makes. It was at least 20C cooler than the previous day! The wind whistled around us all night, and we felt it in our lodge through the thatched roof. It was trying to rain, but mercifully never came to much. Having previously been too hot in just a thin shirt and trousers, today we added a sweater and a hoodie and, after a while, our rain jackets. We were glad of the blankets provided, to keep our legs warm and the cameras dry. Game drives are not so scenic in cloudy weather, but we were hopeful that the cooler weather would bring out more animals. We spent the first half hour unsuccessfully looking for hyenas, and began to fear this might be an ... read more