Sand, Stunts, Souq and Sizzle

While the rest of us slept until it was too hot and bright to sleep any longer, Cora was up extra early to catch a bit of the sunrise.

We had a leisurely breakfast, tidied up the campsite a bit and then went down to the water for a swim. We did a little ‘snorkelling’, really just putting the mask and tube on so that we could see a school of fish that was swimming close to shore and then Thierry and I embarked on a more serious game of aerobie than the previous day.

Serious is a relative term of course and really it was just a longer distance game, though one filled with atrocious throws and multiple trips either way up the beach or into the water in often futile attempts to catch the flying ring.

It was all a good laugh though, mainly for the girls sitting peacefully watching us.

We packed up and headed back to the flat before the morning was even over and cleaned up for the rest of the day. First up was an acrobatic air show by the French equivalent of the Blue Angels.

They were quite good and for 30 minutes filled the sky with red, white and blue plumes of smoke as the flipped, rolled and dodged one another.

It was the first time in years that we had seen one of these shows and it really is amazing how good those guys are. Seems the whole of Muscat came out to watch the show, so the beach was packed. It was nice to see such a mixture of people though from Omani families to Indians and expats.

For the duration of the time we were in Oman, most of the men seemed to wear white dishdashas. Towards the end, however, as storms hit the south of the country and beyond and the weather in Muscat approached more 'wintery' temperatures (low 30s, upper 20s C), many of the men started wearing their darker coloured dishdashas like that above. Some of the younger generation however, simply resort to the jeans and sweater combination like out of a Gap or Next catalogue.

We then made an attempt to leave the area, but that proved extremely difficult as everyone else had a similar plan and the combination of only two roads, Omani drivers and a heckuva lot of people/cars just proved too much for the traffic cops to handle.

We eventually managed to extricate ourselves from the traffic and made our way to their friend’s house for their daughter’s birthday party before heading to Muttrah souq for a little shopping/look around. It being a Friday night, the souq was quite busy and the smells of frankincense, sounds of sellers hawking their wares and enclosed feeling of the narrow lanes added to the overall experience.

We wandered throughout, making a few purchases and in general took in our surroundings. I think we all would have gladly spent hours wandering about there, but we had reservations for a farewell dinner of sorts back in Ruwi.

We didn’t go to the main drag like we had a couple of nights previously, but rather went to the top floor of a large hotel and walked into Tokyo! Well alright, it was merely a Japanese restaurant, but it was a very realistic looking replica of a Japanese interior, complete with Japanese waitresses. We came for the teppan yaki grill, where the chef cooks all your food right in front of you and it was a fantastic experience. So much wonderful food, including some sushi to start and fried ice cream to finish, which if you ever have the chance to try you must as it was truly an indulgent treat!

Our chef; an Indian, trained in Bahrain and cooking in Muscat; was excellent and we all thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Thank you again Adeline and Thierry for this last treat and 'farewell' dinner. It was really special...