Musandam Trip

Land of Frankincense –leban- and fortresses; … that’s Oman. I’ve always wanted to go there and visit some of the off beaten paths. I have been to Dubai many times but this trip was out of the ordinary for me. The highlight was visiting Ras Musandam and view of the famous Strait of Hormouz.



It has been 7 months since flydad last visit to Saudi. He contacted me to tell me about his upcoming trip to Dubai/Oman and asked for some suggestions. We decided mid January would be good time for both of us and so we met one night in Dubai airport. I was accompanied by my newphew Mohammad, a new determined geocacher who is younger and more versatile.. just the qualities one needs for a hard to get cache.

Our first day spent was on the road to Hatta where we found 6 caches. The weather was warmer than in Dammam –not to nephew’s taste- but still cool. We logged Pin Head, memories of Dubai, Pay it forward, Six T, Creatures of D-night and valley view .. all in one afternoon. We had a nice lunch at the Hatta Fort Hotel and on our way back I managed to resurrect the old Road to Hatta cache. This is the same cache that got flydad and I in touch, a year ago.

The following morning we headed early to the east coast of the UAE. We first made an early stop by Camel Master farm where we had a nice breakfast prepared by his wife Camel Mistress. Camel milk in a variety of flavors was on the menu and the setting on a small dune top in front of a tent was absolutely wonderful. We wanted to stay longer but we had a long day ahead of us so we had to excuse ourselves and thanked our hosts. We continued east to Aldhaid and then headed north to Dibba passing Masafi after finding two caches, one of the them was tricky but Mohammad growing skills proved useful. We then headed south to Khor Fakkan and watched from a distance oil tankers lined up to enter the Gulf. A short turn west took us to the Omani exclave of Madha. We claimed a virtual cache there called surrounded and then continued further west to Nahwa to find the wadi bashing cache belonging to UAE. Some discrepancy between what Google maps say and what we saw on ground was noted by flydad regarding this unique exclave of UAE inside Omani inside UAE land.

We spent the night in Fujairah down south and left early morning to Ras AlKhaima. We reached the Omani boarder around noon time. Crossing the boarder was simple and took few minutes. After that we were rewarded with a scenic route that took us in a north easterly direction to the tip of Ras Musandam peninsula. The route was spectacular as we passed by beautiful sandy beaches nestled between the mountains. We made a stop at Bukha; a small village famous for its castle and claimed a cache there. Continuing further north to Ras Shaykh Masoud, we claimed another cache named Smugglers watch, right at the tip of the peninsula overlooking the famous Strait of Hormouz. Almost 25% of the world’s oil passed through this waterway in the last decades. I managed to hide my own cache on a stone wall facing east towards the Iranian Qeshm Island. Our hotel was only few kilometers down to the south east of the Ras Masoud at the entrance of Khasab town. We checked in at the Golden Tulip hotel and spent the night there. That afternoon was a little subdued after Mohammad lost his mobile at Ras Masoud but he wouldn’t let this upset the remaining day.

So the following morning we went to explore the sleepy town of Khasab and went further south on an off road trip that took us to an overlook of Khor Najd. The view down of the beach and fisherman’s dhows was absolutely stunning. We claimed another cache there and to our pleasant surprise we ran into a German couple who were also geocaching in the area. We left Khasab in the afternoon heading back to Dubai and claiming another cache on the way named Sheeba’s palace and hidden by Camel Master. Frankincense was part of the goodies found in this cache and what a better conclusion to a trip that started with memories of Leban and ended with one.

Bahrain caches

I visited Bahrain three weeks ago with family and found 4 caches in one day and managed to hide one of my own .. it was a real treat. We started our search early morning by bagging one in the ancient graveyard of Sitra. I thought the vicinity was a nice easy and accessible place to hide the first GeoPost cache in the Gulf. I first learned about this special cache from geocaching online and so I decided to make one myself. Next we moved south to find two caches not far apart. A great place for Barby was on a small mound .. I spotted the cache from below and pointed it to my son. After logging it we moved to mammalian protuberance. This was a long overdue cache for me and found by my wife.

The fourth was a special one and neatly stashed in Bahrain Fort. My wife and I arrived at sunset. It was a cool November evening with the Fort lit from the ground up .. great photo opportunities. Google Earth placed the cache on the northern perimeter of the castle which fooled me since it was further inside. We searched in the wrong place for about 15 minutes before I realized from the difficulty rating and the style of the setter and his previous hides that this should not be too complicated.

It then occurred to me that we may be searching in the wrong place and indeed we were. The place inward was even more fascinating at night time and we found the cache inside a window just like it was described. I dropped a Saudi coin and left with a great sense of satisfaction.

Geocaching and walking

As a geocacher, walking is part of the game. I’m overweight and I don’t exercise but I try to walk specially with my younger brother who is more athletic and fit than I am. We started to walk on a regular basis .. not much, may be 1.5 to 2.5 km around my house in Dammam. One day he said let’s go for a longer walk – longer to me was like 3 to 4 km - so I said Ok. We walked for 5km to the Sheraton Hotel in Dammam. It felt good and I said why stop here and we continued for another 5km to the corniche. That was a total of 10km .. it was a great accomplishment for me; but not to my brother. Next time he said let’s go for a longer walk and on Ramadan eve, we set out to walk to Al-Khobar. We made the 19km walk in about 3.5hours without break. Now he wants to go further .. Bahrian is on his agenda but I doubt it.

أول إجتماع لهواة الجيوكاشنج في الإمارات

تم اليوم تجمع لمزاولي رياضة الجيوكاشنج في جبل حفيت قرب العين .. هذا هو أول تجمع لمحبي هذه اللعبة في المنطقة. هنا الصفحة الخاصة بهذا الحدث. كنت أنوي الحضور لكن بسبب التوقيت والذي يوافق عشية أول أيام الدراسة لم أستطع الحضور.

Two Kingdoms Connected

Yesterday I went to Bahrain to collect my Aramex shipment containing some travel bugs, nanos and other geocaching accessories that I ordered earlier from Groundspeak. On the way, I decided it was about time to hide a cross-boarder cache on the causeway itself. It would be a special multicache with one part on the Saudi soil and the other part on the Bahrain side.

Being in Ramdan and around noon time, there was little traffic as I drove past the Bahraini customs. After paying the insurance I made a stop on the south eastern side of the artificial island. I stashed the tiny magnetic nano and marked its coordinates. This will be the final stage of this multi cache.

On the way back and after clearing Saudi customs, I turned to the tower building on the south western side of the island. I found a nice green area off the parking lot and decided to look for a hiding place. There it was; a line of trees with some picnic tables beneath. I wrote down the coordinates for the nano on a small piece of paper and rolled it into a tiny silver capsule. Fortunately this cylinder comes with a ring so I tied a string to it and tied the other end to a tree trunk. I made sure the string is not too long so it will not fall and expose the capsule and is not too short so that it can be handled with ease. This is the first part of this multi cache.

Although the two stages are only one kilometer apart, they’re in two separate countries. This tiny cache signifies the small world we live in spite of the apparent distances that keep us apart.

Geocaching in Tirhal magazine

In an interview with Tirhal magazine, I talked about geocaching as it relates to tourism, specially here in Saudi.. I believe it’s the first in Arabic. The magazine is a publication of the Supreme Commission for Tourism and I hope to see more media coverage of the sport and get new geocachers introduced to the game. Here is the article.

يوم حار

إنطلقنا في يوم حار من شهر يوليو بعد الظهر الى الدحول القريبة من طريق القصيم السريع حيث توقفنا أولا قرب دحل بالقرب من طريق صلبوخ القديم ولكن للأسف كان سلمنا قصيرا فلم نستطع أن ننزل بواسطته فغادرنا المكان على أمل العودة مرة أخرى .. ثم اتجهنا الى دحل ضيق المدخل لايبعد كثيرا عن الدحل الأول باتجاه الشرق منه و فوجئنا بوجود ثعبان داخل فوهته فتركناه وقضينا أمسيتنا في مدخل الوادي والذي خبأت كنزي في أحد تلاله الصخرية. دهشنا من فارق درجة الحرارة الكبير بين النهار والليل في ذاك المكان.

في الغد إتجهنا إلى الدحل القريب من الخاتلة ولم نحضر السلم هذه المرة لكنها كانت فرصة لإخفاء كنز بمدخل الدحل الذي اتخذه الحمام ملجأ له من حرارة الصحراء. أكملنا مسيرنا تجاه الحسي وقرى الصفرات والبير ثم قضينا ليلتنا في أحد الشعاب بوادي عبيثران بعد أن صادفنا أحد الرعاة. في الصباح تحركنا تجاه الرغبة مرورا بخشم الحصان ثم القصب التي إنعطفنا شمالا بعدها تجاه الداهنة، أحد الهجر القديمة، وقضينا القيلولة تحت بعض أشجار النخيل المهملة وأخفيت كنزا هناك . بعد العصرعدنا جنوبا وتوقفنا عند الصوح تحت جبال طويق لنشاهد بعض التشكيلات الغريبة للصخور وإخفاء كنز بها .. لم يكن الجو الحار يسمح لنا بإعداد غداء بالرغم من التجهيزات الكثيرة التي قام بإعدادها أبوطلال والتي جعلتنا نبدوا كالحجاج في سفرهم لكننا قررنا أخيرا أن نتوقف في شقراء لنأكل في بيتزا هت.

في طريق العودة توقفنا قبل المغرب في جبل الفهدة وسط النفود بين القصب وثرمداء لإعداد الشاي ثم قفلنا راجعين للرياض التي وصلناها بعد منتصف الليل

Sadous - Underground

I read about this dahl in Mekshat site .. cousin AbuTalal has mentioned it to me earlier so we decided to visit. It’s close to Edge of the World but can’t get to it from there so we had two routes to choose from, either from Huraymla or Sadous .. we chose the latter. It turned out to be a good choice.

I checked the route on google earth and I could see a dirt track that leaves Sadous and goes west all the way to the Dahl. We left Riyadh in the afternoon heat and upon arriving at Sadous we took the wrong turn that lead us north west to the dam. We came down south to look for the track that I saw on Google. Fortunately I had some points along the track jotted down so we connected with the first point and off we went. The road was smoother than I expected. It was about 20km from the village to the dahl.

The opening was just like I saw in the pictures on the northern side of the dahl. I grabbed my cache and took some spare batteries for our flashlights before entering. Cousin Hamad was already inside.
A short ladder resting on a pile of rocks was placed at the entrance which opens to a large chamber –more than 12 meters in diameter- where large piles of fallen rocks gather at one end. We walked around the boulders and found ourselves in front of a long tunnel with well defined semicircular section. The air was very humid and at this point we were sweating like a leaky faucet.

We continued our walk slowly but steadily into the tunnel. The floor was very soft and moist and at some places the soil was black. Other than for the bats, this was a friendly dahl. After 90m or so, we came to a stop at the end of the tunnel where the only way to continue was to go crawling. I spotted a hiding place before the end of the tunnel and stashed my cache there. I later realized that it might not have been the best place considering the soft floor and the possibility it could wash away with any flooding. We left just in time before sunset and made a stop on our way back to eat the watermelon that AbuTalal brought.

Resurrecting Dirab

Being in Riyadh I went to fix the Dirab cache that was muggled, according to the recent logs on the cache page. At the site, I noticed the old container thrown away many meters down from its hiding place .. judging from the place, it was probably force of nature - washed down from the recent rain we had three months ago - I replaced the container and off we went to the other location at Rock & Sand which connects wadi Alawasat with Makkah Road. It was late in the afternoon when I placed my cache there and the views on the red dunes was superb.

Cacher from Canada

Pierre was on a mission .. he came all the way from Canada to bag The Garage (GCPMYN), beside other work off course. He dropped by at my place and had Arabic coffee with dates.
I took some notes on cache hides they have in Canada .. may be will try them here.

Thirty years later

When I placed “The road to Hatta” many years ago (now archived), I didn’t expect that it will introduce me to Flydad, a very enthusiastic geocacher, with many exciting hobbies. He showed interest in an article I wrote on 4D geocaching and that was the start of email correspondence between the two of us. One day, he called to let me know that he will be visiting the area and I was so delighted. An arrangement was made and there he was, at the airport in Riyadh.

On our first day, we left around noon time with cousin AbuTalal and visited the area north west of Riyadh where we stopped by Sadus and Acacia valley before finally reaching the edge of the Tuwaiq escarpment at the edge of the edge of the world. Flydad was bold enough to walk down to the edge so close to the cliff. He suggested adding another star for the terrain rating because of the close proximity of the cache to the cliff.

We came back through the wadi and headed to the car graveyard. AbuTalal was taking a nap while we were searching. From a distance of about 8 meters, Flydad was able to spot the cache and point to it. He was very pleased to be the first to find the cache (his FTF in Saudi). We then finished our day at Barger-Marat and drove up the Kumait Mountain for the view of the ancient village below. A local gentleman approached us when he saw Barger’s book I was holding in my hands and offered to explain some history about the area. He invited us to join him for dinner at his house but we graciously declined. We made a short stop near a water pond just before sunset; perfect setting. We arrived at Riyadh late in the evening and had Shawarma sandwiches for dinner.

On the second day we went west of Riyadh to Tuwaiq escarpment and found X-marks the spot and the Prize, before reaching the Chameleon. It took us about 12 minutes of search before AbuTalal finally uncovers the chameleon from its hide. On our way back we found the Zenda and came to stop for a drink but the weather suddenly changed to what appeared to be a thunder storm. That night we had some Mutabbaq and Foul at AbuTalal house.

On the third day, we decided to stay in town and do some Travel Bug and log maintenance. We exchanged gift items; Flydad offered me geocoins including a beautiful one from the National Reconnaissance Office while I offered him a signed copy of my Geocaching book. We couldn’t resist the temptation to go out that day just for a short time to find the nearby Airport and the Hotel caches. He found both in no time. Later that night, we visited the sky bridge at Kingdom Tower. At lunch, Flydad was surprised to see an item that he hasn’t seen since 31 years ago; Sohat bottled water.

We left for Dammam on our fourth day. Flydad being a glider pilot, we talked about flying, geocaching and traveling; among other exotic topics. Time passed so quickly. Four caches were waiting to be found in or near Dammam and one of them is a FTF (Pipeline, Saihat, Tarut Fort and The Garage). We spent the evening in my brother house chatting and listening to interesting travel stories. Flydad didn’t forget to place a hide near my house with my kids and even managed to convince them to keep the hide secret from me. When I asked my children for hints, they said “What cache, dad?!”. The next morning Flydad left home to Bahrain en route to the US.

I’m amazed with the energy and enthusiasm Flydad has … I had difficulty keeping up with him on many times. His visit is simply unforgettable. He has seen so many changes (physical and social) taking place in kingdom since his last visit some 30+ years ago.

Abu Jifan

The name Abu Jifan refers to the wadi and the nearby wells but is famous for the stop over that King Abdulaziz made here while en route to reclaim Riyadh in 1902. The fort is under renovation today and one can see the wells; some of which with stone lining and still have water.

My cousin and I made an attempt to visit and bag the nearby cache. We came in from the south .. drove to AlKharj and headed west parallel to the old railway to Haradh and then went up north across some farms and then to the open wadi. We reached the escarpment and tried to drive up the steep and narrow track to the west mentioned in Ionis Thompson book but we couldn’t. The track was too dangerous to manoeuvre. Instead, we followed the pylons and parked our car at the closest point possible. We climbed up the escarpment and walked for about 1km. It was getting late and I had to go back to Riyadh for a meeting that evening so we abandoned our journey.

I later learned the fort was accessible from the north but too many fences there and so the easiest way was to go west to Hardah and then come back east following the power line.

A month later we returned from the south as before but took the wadi that is closest to the mountain range (wadi Sudayrah). By mere chance we found a track that goes up the mountains in two stages.. not very easy but doable in 4WD car. Once above the plateau, the track leads to the fort and is quite a scenic drive. We found the cache after some search and then went on to check out the fort. It is going through renovation work and looks to be close to completion. We then drove by some of the wells and headed back from where we came but made a short detour to hide our own cache.

After the descent into Sudayrah wadi we came to a nice picnic spot and so we stopped for a cup of tea and some healthy bread. After sunset we drove back to the tarmac but to our horror we got stuck few meters from the tarmac in a very muddy area .. we thought we were going to be there for the night. To our pleasant surprise and with little driving skills and a lot of luck we managed to get out of the mud. It was a trip to be remembered.

P.S.
In her book, Ionis Thompson mentioned that you need a permission from the department of antiquities to enter the fort but we did not. The only people who were there, besides the shepherds, were the construction workers doing the renovation and they will open the gate for you. We entered with no permits as did many other people we saw there.

وادي المياه

وصلتني دعوة من مدرسة أحمد للقيام برحلة الى وادي المياه يقوم بتنظيمها الأستاذ الفاضل فيصل الزامل. كان موعد الرحلة الثامنة صباحا ولكننا انطلقنا متأخرين قليلا .. عندما أخبرني فيصل عن برنامج الرحلة ومسارها كنت متأكدا تقريبا أننا سنكون محظوظين لو استطعنا تغطية البرنامج في يوم واحد. تحركنا قرابة التاسعة صباحا في ست سيارات .. القافلة تتكون من الطلبة وبعض أولياء الأمور مع المدرسين. اتجهنا غربا على طريق الرياض السريع وحين وصولنا عريعرة انحرفنا شمالا باتجاه حنيذ

توقفنا للبحث عن الفقع ولكننا لم نجد شيئا ثم أكملنا مشوارنا لنقف في مكان آخر من أجل مشاهدة بعض الأدوات التي استعملها الإنسان القديم في حياته اليومية. تناولنا طعام الغداء، الإفطار لبعضنا، تحت شجرة كبيرة خارج حنيذ. بعد أن تعدينا الصرار ب سبعة كم تقريبا، اتجهنا غربا لمسافة كيلومترين تقريبا لنجد جبلا له مدخل جانبي دخلناه زحفا على أرجلنا ليصل الى ثقب في وسط الجبل يتدلى منه سلالم خشبية وكأنه مخبأ ما. قمت بإخفاء كنز هنا في رحلة لاحقة إصطحبت فيها عائلتي.

أكملنا مسيرنا لنتجه الى كهف الماستادون لنشاهد بقايا عظام الحيوانات القديمة ومنها الماموث ولكننا أضعنا مرشدنا وأخيرا عدنا مساء الى المدرسة. في رحلة لاحقة اصطحبت فيها عائلتي استطعنا أن نصل الى الكهف ونخبأ كنزنا بقربها. بدأت تلك الرحلة مبكرا قبل طلوع الشمس (الخامسة والنصف صباحا) حيث استطعنا أن نمر على الأماكن التي لم نتكمن من الوقوف بها مع رحلة المدرسة حيث تجولنا في الصرار ونطاع ومليجة وحتى النعيرية. توقفنا في مكان به بعض الأشجار المتحجرة عدة كيلومترات جنوب النعيرية

شكرا للأخ فيصل على تنظيمه لتلك الرحلة .. للمزيد عن جبل السفينة، راجع التقرير هنا

Jebel Baloum

Although belonging to Tuwaiq mountain range, Jebel Baloum stands alone with a peak of 1045m (see Ionis Thompson’s book). The main mountain is surrounded by smaller ones and can be spotted from quite a distance (15km or so).

I have been to Jebel Baloum twice before through Nissah, to the south of Riyadh, but my cousin Hamad and I wanted to visit the Jebel from the east, i.e., through Wadi (valley) Al Howtah. The place has no shortage of caches and the last time we were there we bagged two caches: Tuwaiqcache and Fifth well.


The latter cache is hidden above some old wells sunk into the ground not far from the main mountain. We also bagged part of Adam’s apple.. probably the most demanding and challenging cache in Arabia. Baloum is the Arabic word equivalent to Adam’s apple.

On my third trip to the Jebel, I woke up one early morning and left Riyadh with AbuTalal & Hamad. The weather was dusty at some places but cleared later. We arrived at Howatah and continued through Na’am, the famous garden of palm trees. By 10:30 we were at Hariq and were running low on fuel but all gas stations were closed because of Friday prayer. We went up north to check the dam and it was empty. At 12:30 we filled up and proceeded through Howtah valley on a dirt road. The track was good and lead us out of the Wadi.

The landscape is beautiful. A sense of serenity and tranquility surrounds the area. The whole site looks like a piece from another planet like Mars … not that I lived there but good for making a movie here. As we left the valley we noted a natural arch on our left. It’s a rock feature at the tip of Khashm Makrouq and is known to geocachers as the flying arch. We approached the arch and bagged our cache in no time .. easy one.

We then continued on a northerly direction to Baloum and had to cross some sand ridges before stopping near the old wells on the eastern side.. It was almost 4:00 p.m.. While AbuTalal was preparing our meal, cousin Hamad and I went up the nearby Jebel to bag Adam’s apple. It was one of the difficult and dangerous hikes we took. Our trip up and down lasted for about an hour but there was actually more to go as we discovered later.

Hiding a Geocache

I found this nice informative article written by a blogger on hiding caches.
Take a look here.

أول كتاب باللغة العربية عن الجيوكاشنج First book in Arabic on Geocaching

صدر حديثا عن الدار العربية العلوم أول كتاب باللغة العربية يتحدث عن الجيوكاشنج بلغة بسيطة. الكتاب موجود في المكتبات السعودية وهو متوفر عبر مكتبة النيل والفرات هنا

Al-Tenhat and Wadi Ash Shawki

Following our trip from the Summan desert (see below), we arrived at Rowdat Al-Tenhat which is a large park-like area covered with lush green plants. It is a popular picnic spot for campers and was very crowded at the time we were there .. almost like an amusement park.

We stopped to take some pictures while my cousin AbuTalal collected some flowers of which he will later make herbal tea. We then continued to Wadi Ash Shawki and spent the night on its bank. Dinner was served around the camp fire at around 9:30 p.m. We woke up before sunset and prepared our breakfast .. Arabic coffee and dates. Herbal tea was prepared by AbuTalal from the flowers he collected earlier.

At around 8:30 we drove along the wadi. Ash Shawki is one of the main wadis that flows in the Tenhat at the base of the Dhana dunes. The trip was unforgettable as we pass by hundreds of sheep and camels grazing through the fertile valley. Occasionally we make stops to examine the landscape or check out some exotic plant. AbuTalal was keen to locate naturally grown mushroom or faga, known to grow sporadically after the rainy season but cousin Hamad and I were eager to locate good hiding place for a cache. Unlike him, we found what we were looking for (GC113B1).

Our drive along the wadi took us on a westerly direction before heading south to Roawdat Nourah (GC10ZWM) which we reached around noon time. I was concerned about our car fuel but my cousin who knew the area well kept assuring me we will be able to make it and sure we did. We arrived at Riyadh around 2 p.m. making this trip the longest we had so far.