Muscat Festival in 2015

This year, Muscat Festival took place again. It is a festival that takes place for a whole month, every single evening. There were different events in various places in the city, and two main venues: Al Amerat and Naseem parks. Last year we visited the festival only in Al Amerat park but this year we also went to Naseem park. In our opinion in Amerat park there was more to look at and enjoy while in Naseem there was mainly an amusement park. Though, in Naseem there was also a village of dinosaurs this year and it was really impressive!

Nobody of us was brave enough to ride a camel 

Not a good photo... but the boys could ride a donkey :)

Waiting for some Arabic food

Wadi Tiwi

We had passed Wadi Tiwi uncountable times but it was only now we thought to drive into the wadi and explore it further. Actually we did not drive far at all because the road is really narrow there and it had been a nerve wracking drive when other cars had driven towards (and it had meant driving backwards until the wider part of the road). Instead, we parked our car and had a walk in the village, passing date palms and banana trees on both side of the road.

Under the bridge...here starts the drive to the wadi

In honor!

Not much space left from one car on the road

One of the mosques in the village

Organic Food and Ecological Products in Oman... a year later

About a year ago I wrote about the selection of organic food and ecological products in Oman. Now, a year later I am ready to make a short update. There have been some small changes.

Coming back this autumn I noticed Carrefour (at least their Qurum branch) had a special counter for ecological cleaning products - no need to look for them among regular products any more :)

Sultan Center seems to have the best choice of organic food. Sadly, when it comes to cleaning/washing products the situation is similar to other stores: the selection is very poor.

Al Fair has also a good selection of organic food, seems to have more organic products than Lulu or Carrefour.

Still no natural disposable diapers available in Oman :( I have had luck to find Libero diapers with Nordic Ecolabel in a pharmacy in Muscat Grand Mall and this is probably the best one can find here.

Still no organic food store in Muscat but The Organics Food and Cafe from Dubai delivers to Muscat twice per month, well done!
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Something else that is in my mind: the squandering of plastic bags. If you go grocery shopping here then all the products that you buy are packed into many and many plastic bags. The persons who help to pack seems to have a system: they divide everything in product groups (i.e. dairy, bread, fruits etc) and then different products go to different bags that means if you buy one pack of butter, apples and bread then you usually end up with 3 plastic bags! In this situation the slogans above the cashiers in Lulu a la "save the planet, use less plastic bags" sound especially ironic.

Over the mountains: from Ar Rustaq to Al Hamra

Last winter we went to Wadi Bani Awf but stopped our route there because it felt we had enough of adrenaline for that day. During summer when Andres was in Oman he took the mountain route over the mountains, through Wadi Bani Awf twice. Now it was our turn to get to know the route. Photos talk more than words, so let me show you the photos:

Old house ruins in Bahla

Wadi Sahtan

Some weekends ago we drove to Wadi Sahtan. We had few destinations within the wadi in mind but finally turned back from the first road. The road was steep and we were "alone", so we decided it was better to leave it for some other time. But we met some camels in the wadi and had great views, so the trip was worth doing :)

Camels in wadi Sahtan

Zig-zag, going up and up...

Villages in wadi Sahtan

Dolphins and turtles

During the last month we went to both dolphin as well as turtle watching. Not in same place and not on same day, though ;)

As for dolphins' watching, I better show you some photos:

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Some weekends ago we drove to Ras Al Jins with my dear friend and her family. We had booked the turtle watching tour at Ras Al Jins Scientific and Visitor Center about a week in advance. We had decided to go for evening tour, starting at 9pm, had to pay 3OMR for an adult and 1OMR for a kid. We were first taken by the bus nearer to the beach, then the guide gave us some information about the turtles nesting while other guide was already further on the beach to look for turtles. After a short walk we arrived very close to the sea and first we could see a turtle that laid eggs: flop and flop, one after another. Then, we saw some turtles who already returned to the sea. Then, another one who was covering the nest with sand. And finally a tiny turtle baby. The guide said we were lucky that we could see so much.

It was not allowed to take any photos (to not scare away the turtles) and it was disgracing how some south-European tourists just could not understand it and the guide had to explain them over and over again that taking photos, even without lighting, is prohibited.

Royal Opera House in Muscat

Muscat's one of the most beautiful buildings seems to be Royal Opera House. So far I had seen it only from the car window but now when my cousin was visiting us it was a good chance to go to see a performance there. Around Christmas, "Broadway On Ice" was played. 

We arrived early to collect the tickets (that I had bought online about a month earlier; I chose tickets that costed 10OMR (around 20€) per person; there were cheaper and more expensive tickets available) and then we had enough time to go for a short walk around the opera house (but we could not go all around; it seems one side of the opera house and garden is VIP zone) and enjoy some cakes in a café nearby. Then it was time to go back to the opera house. Our handbags got scanned and we had to go through security gate - what an experience! I mean I have never visited any theatre with that kind of security control. Then, I was curious to see what the locals wear in the opera house. Actually there are some strict rules about dress-code in the opera house's webpage: The dress code is formal or business including suits or dinner jackets for men and conservative dresses below the knee for women. Dishdasha and Massar for Omani. No jeans, t-shirts, or tennis shoes. 

There were relatively few Omanis enjoying the performance, most of the audience seemed to be either tourists or expats. And to my surprise not many women cared about conservative dressing and there were many skirts or dresses above the knees and some naked shoulders. Not among Omani women, of course, they were wearing abayas (with more decorations than usually seen). But I also did not see anybody sent back from the door, so I suppose they are actually rather relaxed about the dress-code.

The performance was great! I had never seen figure skating live, so I really enjoyed the performance with beautiful and advanced choreography and beautiful music. While watching the performance I could not help but wonder how relaxed Oman actually is. I mean, the skaters were wearing "common" short skater skirts and there was quite some passion in the performance. But maybe that's why there were so few Omanis enjoying the performance because it is still "over the limits" for some locals? Anyway, it was a very enjoyable evening.