Wadi Madbah, Part II

We have been in the states since mid-June and I have lots of photos to post about that as soon as I can. But first, one more story from our overseas adventures:

As promised, a few weeks after our first visit to Wadi Madbah, we returned with a few of Hannah's friends to celebrate her birthday. We left for Oman on Friday the Thirteenth of June. While John was driving us there I read an article in The National (an Abu Dhabi newspaper) about superstitions. Apparently one local superstition is it's a bad omen to accidentally kill a bird. This was a little disconcerting as we had just killed a bird that flew into the front of car a few minutes before. But we're not superstitious and, aside for feeling sorry for the bird, we laughed it off. Perhaps we should have worried.

The trip began much like the first: a few hours of driving, a quick passport check at the border, and a few rough kilometers on a very rocky road.

Goats still do roam on the road to the wadi.

We picnicked at a small not so shady orchard at the top of the plateau near the wadis. There was a group of perhaps a dozen Omani nationals picnicking nearby, all guys.

Always full of energy, even in the heat, the girls climbed both a nearby bluff and a tree. After lunch, we drove just a few minutes to the top of the trail. After a ten minute hike down, we were at the wadi.

More jumping at our favorite wadi.

We were completely surrounded by rugged cliffs.

The narrow canyon.

It turns out that the wadi is full of little fish that like to nibble at your toes. This helps to clean off dead skin and is in fact an expensive service at fancy salons. We got it for free.

Here's where the bad omen strikes. We drove back to Al Ain, an oasis town just over the border in the UAE. We had decided to spend the night at the Mercure Hotel in Al Ain instead of driving all the way back to the city of Abu Dhabi. The hotel is located on top of Jebel Hafeet, a dramatic lone mountain that stands 1,240 Meters tall. The road up has many hairpin turns. John tried to honk the horn at a rather inattentive driver on the way up, but the horn did not work. This is not something you want to find out on such a steep road. But we made it to the hotel safely. Once we checked in, a bellboy helped us with our luggage. When we arrived at our rooms, John reached for his wallet and discovered that the cash he had just pulled out of an ATM the day before was gone. 1000 Arabian Emirate Dirham, about $300. Since the guys near the wadi were the only people we had seen that day, it didn't take long to figure out what happened: while we were at the wadi, someone must have taken the money hidden in the armrest console from our locked car. They probably unhooked our horn (through the car's front grill) so the alarm wouldn't go off when they jimmied our door lock. At least they didn't take the credit cards, the i-pod players, or the loose dvd player in the back. Just the cash. For that we are thankful. Somehow I'm glad that it didn't happen in the UAE. Crime is in fact very low in the UAE because most Emirati are well to do, punishments are severe, and Ex-Pats would just be deported after serving time in jail. Oman is less wealthy and apparently this type of theft is fairly common in the area. We were upset for about an hour, but then we moved on, not wanting to put a damper on an otherwise fun weekend. I guess the moral is don't leave valuables in your car no matter where you are, especially if it's on a Friday the Thirteenth and you've just accidentally killed a bird.

Back at the hotel, the girls jumping in the pool.

The view from the pool at the top of the mountain.

Miles and miles of desert.

The next day we went to the Green Mubazzarah in Al Ain, the only source of fresh water in the Abu Dhabi emirate, with natural springs used for both swimming and drinking. The girls took lots of pictures of the resident cats.

A view of the valley surrounding the springs.

The girls at Green Mubazzarah. So we lost a little cash, but the weekend was still lots of fun!

Day Trip to Oman

We were invited by friends of ours to join them for a day trip to Wadi Madbah, just a few hours away in neighboring Oman. We knew it would be hot, but jumping into cool swimming holes fed by a mountain stream was way too tempting to turn down, so off we went.

Hannah took this nice photo of beautiful flowers against the rugged mountains of Oman.

After about 5 kilometers of driving on a very rocky road, we reached the start of a short hike to the wadis.


Goats do roam, on the way to the wadi.


The lower wadi was small, but deep enough to jump into.


More jumping...


Our friend Tim, jumping in.

There was another wadi a few minutes up the trail. This one was just deep enough for wading, but we saw lots of fish and a nice row of frogs keeping cool in the shade. A small water fall fed the wadi, but the cliff surrounding the fall was too steep to climb, so we turned around and headed back to the cars.

At the last minute we decided to drive around the cliffs to check out the upper wadi. This was the best wadi yet. The pool was bigger and deeper and had lots of options for jumping. The canyon got so narrow at the far end that there was only room for swimming. If you stretched your arms out, you could touch both walls of the canyon.

We jumped from higher and higher cliffs.

The view from the plateau at the top of the cliff.

We picnicked nearby, at a place called Wonder Wall.

Wonder Wall is known for rock climbing. We didn't have ropes, but some of our group still had the energy, even in the heat, to hike up to some shallow caves.

The view from the caves.

A cool striated mountain next to Wonder Wall.

Hannah had so much fun at the wadi that she wanted to go back again, with a few friends, to celebrate an early birthday party. And so we did. Just this past weekend. More on that later.

Aston Martin Driving Experience

"Keep your foot on the brake an push that button." The V8 erupted to life with a loud brap and settled into a cackling, sputtering, uneasy idle. I was strapped in a GT4 spec Aston Martin V8 Vantage getting ready to take off on the first of two ten minute lapping sessions at Yas Marina Circuit with a driving instructor strapped in next to me. The first three cars left the pit lane and then I was next waiting for the marshal to give me the go ahead. Heart rate up, palms a bit sweaty and throat dry...I got the go and took off.  The sound of the car was intoxicating.

The car is a race ready Aston Martin with a stripped out interior, full roll cage and race suspension. It is noisy, cramped, unfamiliar and wonderful. This night has been about two months in the making and the anticipation had reached a fevered pitch by the time we showed up at the track. There was a session in progress when we arrived and we got to watch and listen from the lounge on the second floor which only served to heighten the already intense anticipation. We attended a briefing and then it was down to the pit lane to wait for the beginning of our session.

There were five cars total and by the time I left the pits, the first car was already running at full song down the long straight. There was a series of tight turns and then the very long straight where I buried the throttle and ran up through the gears - immense sound, tach racing through the rev range and violent upshifts. The stands blurring by on either side and the pools of light increasing their cadence across the car as we accelerate all the way to the braking zone. 

I ran a bit cautious to get a feel for the track and the car but consistently shortened my braking zones and upped my cornering speed as we progressed. In the end we were going way faster than I thought they would allow...we were hauling ass for someone (me) who could not afford to buy a crashed Aston Martin. We stayed on the track and I had a very memorable experience - one that I will repeat in the near future.

Before we got strapped in.

The beginning of the long straight.

Coming down a fast sweeper to a 90 degree left hander - hard braking and banging downshifts.

The car is raised on integral jacks. I can't remember if they changed the tires as my instructor was giving me lots of pointers.

Yes....I was fired up when it was all over.

Still getting pointers when it was all done.

A great evening and an awesome experience.
I'll still take a ZR-1.

Weekend Getaways

John wasn't able to take off time for the girls' spring break, so we decided to have two separate weekends at local resorts.

The first was a place called Sir Bani Yas island, located in the Arabian Gulf 2 1/2 hours southwest of Abu Dhabi. About 130 square kilometers in area, Sir Bani Yas used to be a true desert island, without much on it at all. In the 1980s Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan (may his soul rest in peace) turned the island into both a research park for growing trees in the UAE (part of his vision of Abu Dhabi as the garden in the desert) and a wildlife sanctuary, mostly for the native oryx that were becoming extinct in the wild. Today the island is now home to numerous trees, 10,000 mostly free range wild animals, and a small but luxurious lodge that can house about 150 guests and a seemingly equal number of support staff.

The arrival sequence is out of the ordinary. You arrive at a pier on the mainland, board a boat for the 20 minute ride to the island and then board an electric bus (charged by the only wind turbine in the UAE) for the last leg to the lodge. We were met by one of the staff and seated in the lobby for tea and an introduction to the lodge. After the tea and intro we were then escorted to the activities office where we booked some optional activities. Our selection included a morning safari ride, an afternoon snorkeling trip, and a sunset catamaran cruise. The following are pictures from our Sir Bani Yas weekend.

Adrienne during a walk around the lagoon with the lodge in the background.

Breakfast,

Lunch,

Dinner. Kidding.

Please note the women in abayas hanging out by the pool. Pretty standard around here.

Our morning safari ride. The guide was a very entertaining guy from South Africa.

Peacocks were everywhere.

These young bucks put on a good show for about five minutes.

What got our attention at first was the sound. 

Oryx.

Sand Gazelles.

Whipper snapper.

Ostrich.

Arabian gazelle.

Not only do they look good but these guys also make a cool sound

when they shake their train of tail feathers.

Sleepy cheetahs. The number of deer on the island has skyrocketed in recent years, so cheetahs were added for population control. Plans are also being considered to sterilize some of the overly abundant animal herds.

Rock Hyrax. The girls were crazy about these little cuties.

Giraffe.

Viewing platform.

The next weekend we went to Fujairah, about a 3 hour drive from Abu Dhabi, on the east coast of the UAE, next to the Gulf of Oman. Unlike the endless sand dunes of the Abu Dhabi emirate, Fujairah has rugged mountains and rocky terrain, a nice change of scenery. It was a very relaxing weekend at the Fujairah Rotana Hotel, with most of our time spent poolside or on the beach. We shared the resort with mostly Russian vacationers who opted to come to the UAE instead of their standard spring break in Egypt which isn't quite as stable right now.

Sandcastle building was a popular past time.

More sandcastles.

Pool. Our room is the top bay window in the background.

Looking out towards the pool with the Gulf of Oman beyond.