Lawty Towers: Muscat re-visited

Well I thought about editing the previous blogs with pictures. then I thought I'd simply go over it again, much more fun.

In Lee we took last looks at the view across the Solent to the Isle of Wight, but now it had become dull again:

Needless to say Nicola had taken the facepainting thing from our trip out and had launched into it big time:

It wasn't long though before we were on the road to Gatwick. After a huge coffee and browse time we said our goodbyes for now and off we went:

Soon we had the awful flight change at Dubai overloaded airport where everyone sleeops on the floor and on to a quick hour's flight to Oman where we could see for the first time for me, an Arab nation:

After a lightning trip in Linda's Toyota Landcruiser, we were home.

It wasn't long however before we were out and about taking in the views. we went to a Jebel overlooking the "compound " where all the Oman Petroleum people hang out for leisure:

A sort of integrated beach, pool, eating place and fitness centre. Obviously it was well accommodated and they had security to stop all the hoi polloy from coming in. every day we would trot down with Linda to sign us in as guests.

Anyway there was a lot to see so the next day we went to the local shopping centre. It had a tiny mall:

but picturesque I thought. We bought a green glass candle holder thingy. looks ever so good on our sideboard.

Then it was lunchtime, We went to an excellent cafe place, probably not the right name and had a great eastern style buffet lunch for about $NZ 5 each!

of course we did a lot more sightseeing and headed off later to the Souk. We went through the 'burbs:

We saw castles:

and the Sultan's palace (from the outside)

Finally we arrived a the maze of little streeets that made up the Souk. some were really narrow:

But a number were quite spacious:There were a lot of things to look at:

the next morning we had brekkies at the compound:

then we got rigged up for going to the mosque:

We saw it was huge:

It had lovely collonated passages along the side with inset mosaics, starting at one end in the oldest tradition and tribal stuff (recent?) at the other end:

finally we got to the hugely elaborate prayer hall. Stuffing around earlier had made us late for some reason so we fond it was actually closed when we got there. quick talking by David and Linda got us all a 10 min visit inside:

Then it was back to doing what we're best at- Relaxing at the pool or at the beach.

That evening we had a barbie on the shore:

The next day we were off camping. we went through town there were elaborate buildings everywhere, this is a roundabout!

finally we were out of town. They say this is a geologist's heaven. the brown bit on the top of the hills over there is part of the earth's mantle usually 60km down in the earth:

we passed villages:

then we really got into the hills:

there was very little obvious wildlife around. even the donkeys were a rarity:

We were soon at 2800m and you wouldnt have known it except slightly cooler. the countryside was rugged:
While we pitched camp, (more getting picnic chairs and cooker out) the girls found the female numbers of a family under the next tree:

After chatting and getting mint tea they returned with pomegranates, mine was lovely:

after a geological tour, finally we had tea:

with the aid of a campfire:

we laid down under the stars on our camp beds (Penny and me that is). We were up at donkeyrise, we could hear them in the early morning:

then we breakfasted:

after striking camp we motored off again this time to Diana's view:

This is a mini Grand Canyon:

We took a walk here among terraced gardens:

tortuous tracks:

Through old villages:

Finally back to our start:

we drove home, again through all sorts of quaint villages and of course while David rushed off to prepare for work tomorrow, we did what we do best, Laze: