Muscat, Oman

Muscat was a bucket list trip for Peter and yet again he turned up trumps. Due to it’s position north of Yemen on the Sea of Oman I was a tad nervous but in this case I clearly had to eat my words.

Muscat is the capital and the largest city in the Sultanate of Oman. It is situated on the coast of the Sea of Oman and sits right at the foot of the Hajar mountains. The mountains divide the city into 3 areas and when the current Sultan (Qaboos bin Said al Said) took control from his father in a bloodless palace coup his aim was to make the country an international destination and completely modernise it through rapid infrastructural development. This he has achieved with great results that has led to the growth of a vibrant economy. Oman is an absolute monarchy and the Sultan has complete control. He is now in his seventies, without a son and heir, and has recently spent many months in Germany due to ill health. No direct heir to the throne is causing some concern as Oman is facing economic issues due to flagging oil prices and diminishing reserves. It has a population of 2.7 million people with only 2 million of them being Omani, the remainder being Indian, Egyptian, Bangladeshi or Phillipino.

Muscat is a city built amongst the rocky mountains and the 3 different areas are joined by huge highways carved through the rock. There are no skyscrapers in Muscat. All new buildings must be no taller than 8 floors, and be either cream or white. These rules are to encourage building out not up and therefore enlarging the city.

The easiest way to get around is by cab, however, you must negotiate the fee before getting into the vehicle otherwise you can guarantee you will be overcharged. We were caught once when he told us to hop in quickly as we were near an intersection then tried to charge us 10 Rial for a trip that should have cost 6 Rial. Eventually we got him down to 8 but couldn’t stop and get out as by then we were on a motorway. As we only had 2 full days we decided the easiest way to see everything was on a 24 hour hop on hop off bus with 10 different stops. It just happened to go past our hotel and the friendly drivers would drop us at our hotel door. It was a difficult decision to do the bus and not individual cabs as we do try to support local business when travelling but the bus was definitely the best option due to it’s frequency, slow pace and value. So what did we see:

-The Royal Opera House built on the Royal orders of Sultan Qaboos of Oman is an impressive modern white building with it’s luxury restaurants, cultural retail market and formal landscaped gardens.

-The Al Alam palace is one of the Sultans 7 Royal residences throughout the country. It has a Gold and blue façade and is flanked by Portugese forts built in the 16^th century.

-The Parliament Building only completed in 2013 is a traditional low rise Omani style building which unfortunately is not open to the public

-Shatti Al Qurum beach is the centre of the tourist zone with it’s warm, shallow, waters and near all the big hotel chains

-Qurum park is a large and attractive park with a lake, plenty of trees giving shade making the perfect picnic spot and family area

-Marina Bandar Al Rowda is a fully equipped marina housing yachts and launches with restaurants, swimming pool, spa pool and is the base for dolphin tours and sunset cruises

-Mutrah souk retains the atmosphere of a traditional Arab souk selling everything from rugs to jewellry to perfume but is now housed in a modern building – must be prepared to bargain hard

-Mutrah stretches along the Corniche which is also the main port and houses the fish market where the daily catch is delivered to be sold. The port is also home to the Sultans private yacht and is a cruise ship destination. In 2 days we saw 3 cruise ships enter the harbour. It is also a good place to see the giant incense burner on the hill.

The local mosque was just across the road from our hotel and the call to prayer 5 times a day meant the area was always busy. With Friday being the Muslim day of worship, it was interesting to see several thousand men coming to pray carrying their prayer mats. Mosques are built with terraces so worship can take place outside as well as inside.

To celebrate our last night in the Middle East we decided to treat ourselves to an all you can buffet dinner. It was well priced with a huge variety of both meat and vegetarian dishes – no pork of course. The first 2 nights we ate the local street food which was delicious and incredibly cheap.

We had 2 days of enjoying the unique Arab atmosphere that is Oman and it’s people. We learned more about the Islamic faith than we ever knew and met some friendly and informative Omani people along with many migrants who work in Oman and return to their homelands and families just once a year. How difficult it must be to have to live so far away from family in order to support them. We are so lucky living in NZ.