A delayed flight from Muscat meant we did not reach our hotel until after midnight. Although Salalah is Oman’s second city and the capital of the south, our drive from the airport suggested it was quiet, dark and low-rise. Around 100km from the Yemeni border, Salalah has a population of 300,000 most of whom appeared to be asleep.
 |
| Salalah, Capital of the south |
In the morning we found the restaurant empty and no buffet laid out. We were wondering if we were in the wrong place when a young man appeared and asked what we would like for breakfast. ‘Puris and dahl?’ he suggested when we hesitated. We said that would be fine and he looked delighted. Clearly an Indian ‘guest worker’, perhaps he was pleased by us choosing an Indian breakfast, or maybe that was what the chef had already made. He quickly rustled up fruit, puris, dahl, boiled eggs, cake, juice and tea.
Taqah
We saw no one else in the restaurant or on our walk to the lobby where R, our driver and guide for our time in Salalah introduced himself. We wasted no time in setting off for Taqah, a small coastal town some 30km east of Salalah.
R drove us up a hill behind the town for an overview.
 |
| Taqah |
Salalah and Taqah were different from the northern towns we had seen, where every dwelling had its own extensive compound. Here, lacking compounds the buildings clustered together rather than expand haphazardly into the desert. As in the north there were many new buildings, and plenty of old buildings in a state of dilapidation.
 |
| Dilapidated buildings, central Taqah |
Our reason for visiting Taqah was to see its small, but perfectly formed fort. The real reason we were looking down at it from the hill was that we were waiting for the bus tour to go away.
 |
| Taqah Fort |
Eventually they went. The fort is too small to share with a busload, not that it is really a fort, even less a castle as it claims over the door. It was built in the 19th century as the private residence of tribal leader, Sheikh Ali bin Taman al-Mashani. Who he? He was the grandfather of Mazoon al-Mashani, and she was the mother of the current ruler, Sultan Qaboos, no less. She is buried in a nearby graveyard.
 |
| Inside Taqah Fort |
The residence became the property of government in the 1920s during the time of Sultan Qaboos’ father and the walls and towers were only added in the 1960s.
 |
| Inside Taqah Fort |
It is now a small museum, which means it has more contents than most real forts…
 |
| Inside Taqah Fort |
…and the shrub Lynne is inspecting in the courtyard is a frankincense tree - I will discuss frankincense at greater length later.
 |
| Lynne inspects the frankincense tree, Taqah Fort |
Wadi Darbat
The Salalah region is the only part of Oman far enough south to catch the edge of the south-west monsoon. The rainfall is small by monsoon standards but July and August, ‘the summer’ in most of the northern hemisphere, is locally called khareef (autumn). They are the coolest months of the year and the days are filled with mist and drizzle; for a while the land turns green and enough rain falls in the mountains for streams to flow throughout the year.
Living in a shrivellingly arid country, Omanis find fresh, flowing water irresistibly attractive and R drove us north from Taqah towards the mountains where Wadi Darbat descends to the coastal plain in a sizeable waterfall we were frustratingly never quite in the right position to photograph. The road climbed into the hills, reaching the Wadi at a scenic riverside reserve, unsurprisingly a prime picnic and barbeque site for locals.
 |
| A gentle cascade on Wadi Darbat |
The stream continues to the edge of the hills,...
 |
| Wadi Darbat heads towards the drop to the coastal plain |
….drops to the plain and makes its way to the sea near Khor Rori (spellings vary) via a silted up lagoon, once southern Arabia’s most important harbour.
 |
| Khor Rori |
Sumharam and Khor Rori
The road down to the plain was infested by camels, which is not unusual in this area.
 |
| The camel-infested road down to Sumharam |
There are those round here who love their camels like cowboys loved their horses, but the look on this fellow’s face suggests he has enough self-love not to need anyone else.
 |
| Am I not beautiful? |
The city of Sumharam on the edge of the inlet was established in the 1st century BCE as an eastern outpost of the Kingdom of Hadhramaut, which ruled what is now eastern Yemen and south western Oman. The Salalah region produced most of the world’s frankincense and by developing Sumharam next to a large natural harbour the Hadhramites hoped to control the trade in this expensive and much sought-after commodity.
 |
| The zig-zag entrance to Sumharam |
The city thrived for several centuries, but eventually declined, was deserted and buried by the sands. It was rediscovered in the 1890s by British explorer and archaeologist James Theodore Bent. American excavations in the 1950s and those of the Italian Mission to Oman more recently have established the ground plan of the settlement and found evidence for contacts with the Ḥaḑramite homeland to the west, India and the Mediterranean.
 |
| Among the old stones, Sumharam |
We learned this from the film in the visitor centre [and two days later saw some artefacts in the Salalah museum.]
 |
| Recently recovered artefacts from Sumharam in the Salalah museum. Maybe age makes them look rough-hewn, but the carving of the ibex is sophisticated. It is dated 'iron-age'. |
After the film we had a wander.
 |
| Rebuilding parts of Sumharam |
…and a look at the lagoon, but despite Sumharam being part of the "Land of Frankincense" UNESCO World Heritage Site there is not a great deal to see.
 |
| The former harbour at Sumharam |
One of the larger buildings became known early on as The Queen of Sheba’s palace - every archaeological site in and around Yemen has been associated with her at some time or another. The Queen of Sheba is a problematic figure, but if she did exist, she would have met the equally problematic King Solomon several centuries before Sumharam was founded.
 |
| Defences above the harbour, Sumharam |
Mirbat
Mirbat, 40km east of Taqah, is the next settlement along the coast.
The Tomb of Mohammed Bin Ali
On the edge of the town we stopped at a tiny mosque built over the grave of Mohammed Bin Ali. Y told us the saint, a descendant of the Prophet, had brought Islam to the area. Other sources say he died in 1160 CE, when Islam was already well-established, and had founded a madrassa. His memory is respected, even if there is some confusion over what he is remembered for. His tomb, with the usual embroidered green covering, largely fills the mosque. No photographs were allowed inside, so here is one of Lynne outside.
 |
| The tomb of Mohammed Bin Ali, Mirbat |
Churches and graveyards almost always go together; this is rarely the case with mosques but here we have an exception. Muslim tradition does not favour elaborate headstones, but simple stones have been laid in abundance, three marking the grave of a woman, two a man. In Muslim burials the body is placed on its side with the face pointing towards Mecca but many of the older graves here are on a different alignment, suggesting they are pre-Islamic and well over a thousand years old.
Like most Omani towns the old centre is falling down…
 |
| Old centre of Mirbat |
…and once treasured windows look sightlessly onto an abandoned square.
 |
| Old Mirbat |
But this is a sign of wealth, not poverty. On the edge of the decaying area is a shiny new mosque…
 |
| New mosque on the edge of the old town of Mirbat |
…while one street away the modern centre is clean and propserous.
 |
| Mirbat's modern centre |
The Tomb of Job
We drove back to Salalah where R chose an Indian Restaurant for lunch. The chicken and vegetable curries were all right if uninspired, the beef dish was Chinese. On its own it would have been fine, but the combination was weird. Gulab Jamun for dessert provided some redemption.
Leaving the coast, we set off north. At Beit Zarbij, on the edge of the desert plateau 27km from Salalah, is the tomb of the prophet Job.
 |
| Outside the Tomb of Job, Beit Zarbij |
A sign outside tells us the grave is 4m long, but who was this chap who required such an extravagantly sized plot?
 |
| The Tomb of the Propher Job |
Job, the Islamic Prophet and the eponymous hero of the Old Testament book are one and the same, the Bible and Quran stories of his obedience to God being tested through many trials are very similar. The Job mentioned in Genesis (Ch46v13) as the son of Issachar and grandson of Jacob (aka Israel) is generally agreed to be someone else. Helpfully a genealogy of the prophets hangs on the tomb wall so we can see that Job is a descendant of Esau, the son of Isaac and grandson of Abraham.
 |
| Genealogy of the Prophets, Tomb of Job |
Some Muslims and Christians love to take all this literally, and the lack of mention of Hebrew law persuades some Christians that he lived, maybe 500 years before Moses, which would be 600 years after the Flood. I am no Biblical scholar, and know less of the Quran, but some who study these things suggests the Book of Job was an allegory written for teaching purposes and there never was a historical Job. That must be wrong as we were standing by his grave – and he has other graves at Haroun in Syria, Urfa in southeast Turkey and in the El-Chouf mountains of Lebanon, so that proves it!
Mughsayl Beach
We returned to the city and headed out to the west, past the busy, container docks and out to Mughsayl Beach some 10km from the city.
The long sandy beach was empty…
 |
| Mughsayl Beach |
…but the man in the camel meat stall obviously expected custom, perhaps later when the heat had subsided. We tried some cubes of meat; as we found in Birkat Al-Mawz, camel is tender, pleasant but not strongly flavoured.
 |
| Camel meat stall, Mughsayl Beach |
The blowholes, the main attraction of the beach required us to follow a walkway across the low but rugged cliffs.
 |
| Across the cliffs to the blowholes, Mughsayl |
Before we set off R told us something important. The blowholes at the end of the walkway, which launch water so spectacularly into the air, only do so at high tide. Currently, the tide was out. I thought R should have checked this before we set out and arranged our visits in a different order, but it was too late now. On the plus side, Lynne could peer down the gratings over the blowholes with no danger of getting a face-full of high-pressure briny.
 |
| Lynne peers safely down one of the blowholes, Mughsayl |
Dinner in Salalah
Once we had watched the blowholes not blowing, we returned to Salalah. Later we set out in search of a light dinner. Walking towards the street with most of the city’s restaurants we passed the ‘Prestige Restaurant’ and deciding we needed prestige as much as food we dropped in.
Sharing a big fish seemed a good idea, but although the menu was long, much of it was aspirational rather than on offer. Kingfish, our first choice, was off, so we enquired of the friendly waiter how large a sheree fish might be – we would not want to share a sardine. We were reassured it would be fine, and indeed it was.
 |
| So that's what a sheree fish is, Salalah |
I have no idea what a sheree fish is – google has never heard of it, though I did find an obituary for someone of that name. On the plate – and in the picture above – it looks like a turbot, but they prefer cooler waters. Perhaps it has relatives.
Oman, Kingdom in the Desert
A Sheree fish is what we call a spangled emperor in Australia. They abound in Oman. Pity you never took a photo of the fierce king whose visage adorns the archway in Khor Rouri. I wonder did you walk up on the headland. It looks natural from afar, but is marvelous because it is almost entirely man made. Every bit as magnificent as Macchu Picchu.
ReplyDeleteThanks for reading, and for your comment. The mystery is solved. Had I Googled Sheri fish I would have found it, but I naively assumed the transliteration of a menu in a small restaurant was the only spelling. As for Khor Rouri, I don't remember an arch or a fierce king, there was much rebuilding going on in 2018, could it be 'new'?
Delete