This weekend, friends invited us to join them at Jebal Akhdar. We stayed at Sahab, which was a lovely hotel, but next time we will try another popular new place. After we adjusted our route on google maps, it was easy to find. There is a police checkpoint at the bottom of the mountain and you are only allowed up with a 4WD vehicle, because it is so steep and winding. I tried not to pay attention.
A popular brand of drinking water is named after Jebal Akhdar, but I have no idea where they claim to get this water (that's a lie: it is likely desalinated as is all the rest of our water, so from the sea), but there is no apparent source of water on Jebal Akhdar. There is a falaj system (see my photos below), but that is most definitely not drinking water.
After Tommy's football match on Friday morning (his team won!), we went home, packed the car and set off on what was meant to be a two hour drive but actually took three and a half due to bad mapquesting. I assume full responsibility. After we arrived and checked in, we went on a hike through some villages. Everybody thought we were crazy to go to the mountains in the middle of winter, and in the evening after the sun went down, we did wear fleece coats. It felt so nice and cozy!
In the morning, we finished the hike and then drove back to Muscat as one of us had to get into the office. Still, nice to have him around a bit more than usual this weekend.
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| They are standing on the falaj. |
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| Our hotel - the pool was not heated, so the kids took over the hottub. |
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| That's our hotel on the top of the hill. |
I realize I could probably Google it, but what's a falaj system?
ReplyDeleteHi! Sorry, I just saw this. It's the irrigation system for the crops.
ReplyDeleteGood morning, how are you?
ReplyDeleteMy name is Emilio, I am a Spanish boy and I live in a town near to Madrid. I am a very interested person in knowing things so different as the culture, the way of life of the inhabitants of our planet, the fauna, the flora, and the landscapes of all the countries of the world etc. in summary, I am a person that enjoys travelling, learning and respecting people's diversity from all over the world.
I would love to travel and meet in person all the aspects above mentioned, but unfortunately as this is very expensive and my purchasing power is quite small, so I devised a way to travel with the imagination in every corner of our planet. A few years ago I started a collection of used stamps because trough them, you can see pictures about fauna, flora, monuments, landscapes etc. from all the countries. As every day is more and more difficult to get stamps, some years ago I started a new collection in order to get traditional letters addressed to me in which my goal was to get at least 1 letter from each country in the world. This modest goal is feasible to reach in the most part of countries, but unfortunately, it is impossible to achieve in other various territories for several reasons, either because they are very small countries with very few population, either because they are countries at war, either because they are countries with extreme poverty or because for whatever reason the postal system is not functioning properly.
For all this, I would ask you one small favour:
Would you be so kind as to send me a letter by traditional mail from Oman? I understand perfectly that you think that your blog is not the appropriate place to ask this, and even, is very probably that you ignore my letter, but I would call your attention to the difficulty involved in getting a letter from that country, and also I don’t know anyone neither where to write in Oman in order to increase my collection. a letter for me is like a little souvenir, like if I have had visited that territory with my imagination and at same time, the arrival of the letters from a country is a sign of peace and normality and an original way to promote a country in the world. My postal address is the following one:
Emilio Fernandez Esteban
Avenida Juan de la Cierva, 44
28902 Getafe (Madrid)
Spain
If you wish, you can visit my blog www.cartasenmibuzon.blogspot.com where you can see the pictures of all the letters that I have received from whole World.
Finally, I would like to thank the attention given to this letter, and whether you can help me or not, I send my best wishes for peace, health and happiness for you, your family and all your dear beings.
Yours Sincerely
Emilio Fernandez