My first border run fell the day before National Day, December 1, on the last day of my visa. However the process of getting out was not as straightforward as I had believed it to be. After searching for buses and services to make the border run or the trip to Oman, I concluded that it was safer and a better deal to fly from Sharjah (the city next to Dubai) to Muscat, stay for a day and explore the city, and then return the same day. It was cheaper in the end to do this than to take the bus and pay for a hotel in Oman to have a day to explore. The only problem was that the woman at the airline booking office did not believe that I could stay the day in Oman. Because so many expats book their border run flights—land in Muscat, turn around and fly to Dubai—she thought I had to get right back on the plane and fly home. After running around Dubai to find the Immigration office that could answer that question, I was vindicated in my belief that I could, for the small price of $30 for the Omani visa, stay in Oman for the day and tour Muscat. (That is a note for any other travelers trying this trick—do not let the airline agents convince you that you must turn right around. You can get a visa on arrival in Oman, stay the day, and then return on the evening flight).
So on the appointed day I rose early and, thanks to the generosity of my new roommate Danny, was driven to the Sharjah airport (that drive saved me about two hours had I gone by public transit). It’s amazing when you fly out of Sharjah how quickly the beaches and towers of Dubai fade and the landscape changes. Soon you are flying over hills and canyons of varying hues of red, orange, yellow, and brown, all changing shape beneath your window. These hills continue changing shape until after about an hour, they meet the ocean with only a line of city to separate the two. This is Muscat.
From the air, Muscat stretches along the coast and inland, its multiple centers separated by hills with suburbs nestled in the picturesque valleys. The airport occupies a stretch of desert not far from the main city centers but far enough to appear in a different world from the rest of the city. After deplaning and paying my visa fee, I was out of the airport to find a cab and head to town. For a long time once you leave the airport, you drive through desert, sandy dunes and rocky hills alternating outside your window. Without much warning, you break through into first the financial center, a small, low to mid-rise development reminiscent of a roadside town along Route 66 that has spawned a few office towers. From here, another passage through hills and you are in Muttrah, the first seaside hamlet of Muscat. Here I alighted from my taxi to begin my walking tour of historic Muscat. Guided by a scribbled version of Lonely Planet’s walking tour and a map I picked up in Dubai, I set out first for the fish market. Following the birds and the smell, I found the market without much difficulty and soon was immersed in the stalls of the day’s catch being gutted, sliced, and thrown on ice for customers to peruse. Many types of fish were available in different stages of preparation but all were fresh from the sea.
From here I set off for the main souk to continue my shopping (no, I did not buy any fish—probably would be hard to take back on the plane) but first paid a stop at the main museum. Beginning with paintings of horses in the temporary gallery by a local artist, I moved on to learn about the history of the city. I was unaware that Muscat was one of the ports controlled by the Portuguese during their days of oceanic supremacy until I visited this museum. Littered throughout the city today are the relics of this occupation—forts and watchtowers occupy almost every hill and high point in the city still watching for invaders. After reading about Omani customs, dress, and history, I moved on to the souk for a little shopping and a comparison to the hectic souks of Dubai (to be discussed in a later post).
Though the old souks are predominantly gone, what remains is still quite an experience. Shops crammed side by side in narrow, wooden-arched passages overflow with goods of all shape, size, and manner while the proprietors gladly try to drag you in to view each piece. Though the environment attempts to recreate the old days of spices, pearls, and jewels overflowing from these stalls, the shine on the glass and wood belies the true age of the establishment—this souk is more for tourists than traders. Still, if you are looking for Omani dress or weapons (for example al khanjar, the traditional knife of the Arabic region), this is the place to come. Every other shopkeeper is happy to sell you a dishdasha and Omani cap. My advice to Americans and Europeans though is be careful on prices. Omani riyals, the local currency, are pegged to the dollar such that 1 riyal = $2.75 which means that something which costs 10 riyals may sound like a good price after Dubai (10 dirhams = 1 riyal, or $2.75) but is in fact 10 times what you may be thinking—I had to do this math several times to realize just what I was paying throughout the day. My personal opinion now is that if I controlled a country’s currency, I would want this type of exchange rate so that visitors think prices are cheap (who wouldn’t buy a burger combo for 2 OR?) when in reality, it’s not as good a deal as you think! Or maybe that’s just me…
Anyway, returning from my tangent, from the souk it was off to arguably the best part about Muscat—the Corniche. Now Abu Dhabi has a Corniche too, as do Sharjah and Dubai, but something about the clean, crisp air of Oman wafting gently through your hair combined with the picturesque image of the deep blue sea rolling up to the base of towering hills topped with crumbling 16th century forts tops any modern city view from the UAE Corniches. I believe I probably could have spent much of the afternoon just strolling, sitting, and enjoying the fresh air here but for the fact that I was on a time budget and determined to see as much of Muscat as humanly possible in one day.
I lingered as long as I could on this beautiful seaside walk, and lucky for me, the road by the ocean wound around the peninsula by the beach to the next sector of Muscat—Muscat proper. As I walked I could enjoy the salty air, the afternoon’s light breeze, and the sound of the waves crashing on the breakers beside me. Along the way, I passed numerous other old Portuguese lookouts on the hills as well as gorgeous rock crags and statues along the nice broad sidewalk. Around one bend, the Portuguese forts gave way to a gleaming marble statue of an incense burner followed around the next bend by a picturesque site of a little seaside town tucked into a pocket between the hills and the water. The bright white of the monument and building were set off perfectly by the beautiful deep blue of the air and water and the rough brown hues of the land. The whole sight was gorgeous and easily enough for a day’s relaxing.
Continuing my walk, I came eventually to the old gate into Muscat which still stands strong and proud welcoming visitors into this old city. Deviating here from the main road, I wandered into a little neighborhood nearby to find another museum on Oman. Here I took in old outfits, weapons, jewelry, and housing styles alongside photos by an Omani photographer. This was yet another nice introduction to Oman’s history and culture and taught me a lot about the importance of clothing, jewelry, and weaponry in identifying with one’s tribal past in the Middle Eastern region. Outside, the view was just as beautiful as the rest of the city with white homes pitted against brown hills with a dash of color from the pink flowers currently in bloom during this mild winter.
Another short walk after this, I found myself at the ruler’s palace. Compared to all of the traditional buildings I had seen in Oman and even the UAE, this was about as far from the traditional style as I could believe. The rich colors contrasted with the white of the surrounding buildings thereby proclaiming the importance of the occupant. In form, the building seemed less regal. Cone-shaped pillars that widen toward the roof welcome entrants into the boxy home with a wide, flat roof. The appearance is very modern relative to the rest of the city or even to a typical ruler’s palace. However, that notion of “typical” may be based on Western conceptions of what creates a regal, stately form and not an Omani conception. In fact, for all I know, this is the epitome of regality in Omani culture. I’ll let you decide.
Around the back of this palace was yet another view of hilly fingers of land reaching into the sea, tipped with Portuguese forts still watching for pirates and traders. This peaceful setting was perfect to bask in the late afternoon sun, breathe deeply the pure air, and listen to the crashing of the waves on the breakers. However after a short stroll, my silence was broken by a taxi driver looking for work, and as it was time to head to the airport and back to Dubai, I employed him. En route, we took a detour to a couple other beaches of Oman to see the five star resorts on the sea, but soon enough I was back in the airport and on a flight to Dubai.
As I crossed back over the now dark border, I pondered the whole day and how different it was from anything I had experienced in Dubai. This city, Muscat, is still comprised of the older mode of development, at least along its coastline. While it does have a growing financial center, it has not monopolized its coast with five star resorts or reclaimed its hills in a mad scramble for an ocean view. Instead, it has retained its character of pearly white buildings nestled gently between the mountains and the ocean. The thick-walled, small-windowed structures are undoubtedly part of the reason that per capita energy use is 4 times less than its ostentatious neighbor (these designs help prevent the scorching heat from getting in) while the white-washed walls represent a smart, simple way to reflect sun and keep the interior nice and cool. These simple, traditional practices have been forgotten in Dubai in favor of the glass boxes that represent a Western notion of modernity. Hopefully Oman will never lose this tradition as it gives Muscat a unique character that is absent in the modern commercialism of neighboring Dubai.
Another major difference worth noting between Oman and the UAE is that every taxi driver I had in Oman (which admittedly was a sample size of 2) was an Omani national. In conversation with them, I learned that this is typical of the country. Omanis occupy most jobs in the nation which is in strict contrast to the UAE where many jobs, especially on the level of taxi drivers and other service professions, are performed by Indians, Pakistanis, or other immigrants. In Dubai this stems from the small population of Emiratis relative to the size of the economy as well as to the social contract that Emiratis have with the government guaranteeing them housing, monetary, and educational benefits by virtue of the citizenship (this stems, I’m told, from a sense that because the oil resources of the nation belong to the nation, each citizen is therefore entitled to a share of the resource and the profit that accrues there from). I’m not sure how these factors play out in the context of Oman (I’d be interested if anyone out there knows!), but my guess would be that the poorer oil resources have not been distributed among the citizens in the same manner and that there are simply more Omanis in the country as a percentage of the population. With a higher percentage of Omanis and a more even distribution throughout the economic strata, it would only be natural that they would occupy a wider range of jobs than do Emiratis in the UAE.
That ends my discussion of Muscat and Oman, but not of my experiences dodging the Immigration authorities in the UAE. Not long before the New Year I was required to once again slip outside the borders of the country to renew my visa status. This time, rather than fly, I accepted the generous offer of my roommate Danny to experience the typical expat visa run via the border at Hatta. So late one morning we jumped in his car and quickly left the staggering heights of the buildings behind on the road to Hatta, a city in the Emirate of Dubai right on the border with Oman. From my limited experience in the UAE along the coast and in Al Ain, I did not consider the country to be mountainous in any real manner. In my experiences between cities, the sands did not change color much nor did they rise above a few feet from the road (save for the sight of Jebel Hafeet, a mountain in Al Ain). Yet on this road, it wasn’t long before Danny and I were surrounded by dunes that he said were great for a quad bike and which had changed from the yellows of the beach to a deeper orange.
Continuing through these, the dunes gave way to veritable hills with rocky outcroppings and protrusions in the distance, a deeper red still than the dunes before. I had never thought that so barren a landscape could be so beautiful, but here was an example of beauty among the sands. Even in my desert experiences in California, the vegetation had provided an element of beauty through gnarled, twisted trees, occasional shrubs, and the even rarer flower. Yet here, the beauty was in the absence of vegetation and the windswept dunes and barren, beaten mountains. Somehow the turmoil of the centuries had sculpted a beautiful landscape.
After another hour or so of riding through this landscape, we crossed the border into Oman. Well, sort of. Apparently you drive through a portion of Oman just to reach Hatta because you don’t leave your car and soon are once more in the Emirate of Dubai where you can find a shopping strip of just about every clay pot you could imagine. Shop after shop sells these pots so that should you decide to shop, you would have no shortage of choice and probably the ability to bargain to your price. After a short ride more, you pass through the small town of Hatta and find the real border.
There are numerous expat fora and sites documenting how to do this border run, but below is our experience for anyone interested. We parked and walked up to the UAE visa office where I was stamped out of the country easily. Danny, as my driver, was allowed to go into the No-Man’s-Land between the countries without the exit stamp provided he didn’t continue into Oman. So we drove the few kilometers to the Omani border checkpoint (which, as a nice plastered building in traditional Omani style made the portable bungalows of the UAE side look shabby) and parked on the No-Man’s-Land side. We walked in and joined the queue (which frustratingly was closed before we reached the window only to reopen after we had joined the back of another queue) waiting to get my visa. A quick 200 AED payment was followed by both entry and exit stamps in my passport, and within half an hour Danny and I were out the door and back in the car. Stopping again at the UAE checkpoint, I got my new UAE visa, no questions asked, and was legal yet again, this time until I would depart by plane.
Well, since we had driven so far out of town for this (expensive) stamp, Danny and I figured we would make a day of it and spend the afternoon exploring the rocky border between the two countries. At no time were we entirely sure which country we were in as it seemed like we crossed back into the unofficial Omani border at least once. However after an hour or so of asking directions and off-road driving (in a small front-wheel drive car), we arrived at the Hatta Rock Pools. While much more impressive after rain (which is very rare), the pools were still a cool collection of smoothed rock formations created over time by the forces of wind and water. As the late afternoon sun slowly dipped to the horizon, we hopped from rock to rock over the pools, stopping where the level was high enough to feel the cool water within. After a while, we reached a point where it was difficult to go further and so stopped to relax, watch the sun set, and reflect on the absolute silence of nature. In a city like Dubai, it is hard to imagine silence sometimes, but out here with the lack of vegetation and animals, you could sit and hear nothing for several minutes. Eventually an unseen bird would shatter the silence with a shrill call, another might respond, but then again would exist nothingness—a perfect void through which the sun slowly sank, its long rays creating cavernous black holes in the rocks around us.
As the sun finally slunk below the horizon, we figured it was time to go before all light was gone and the bumpy road was harder to find. Now that we had blazed the trail the first time out, the road back was easier, and soon we found ourselves at the Hatta Fort Hotel for a nice dinner. Danny said this was his favorite stop en route back to Dubai when he made his border runs, and for both of us, a Scot and an American, the lingering Christmas music, lights, and tree in the dining room provided one last hint of the holiday season.
If you’ve never experienced an empty desert, don’t write it off as barren or ugly. If there is anything that this day showed me, it is that the rolling dunes, windswept hills, and rocky outcrops are not only beautiful in themselves, but can hide pockets of beauty like the Hatta pools within their midst. If you are in Dubai and need a natural escape, steer course for Hatta. Get your visa stamped and then explore the natural beauty as a respite from the bustle and volume of the city. It is well worth the time, provides a great emotional recharge, and if you go with a friend is a wonderful time to chat and share experiences.
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