Muscat, Oman

Oman is difficult to get around as so many people use private transport and Muscat is even more so as it doesn't have public buses. We caught a shared taxi to a roundabout on the outskirts of the city and then had to engage it as private hire to take us to our hotel, of course it cost more for the short ride than the whole journey.







Muscat is a long narrow city spreading for 50 kms along the coast and fitting in where it can around steep rocky peaks. It is divided into three parts, the old port where the royal palace is, the commercial and business centre at Ruwi, and the corniche and souq area in Mutrah.







Roundabouts are important landmarks in Oman as they are where shared taxis, intercity buses and minivans can be found and where you will be dropped. Consequently, they are well kept and often ornately decorated with some kind of theme, fish, dolphins, clock towers, coffee pots and even book sculptures. They have green well watered lawns which use treated effluent water but it seems a huge waste for a desert country.







We have been hanging out for some hot weather but Muscat has had several days of temperatures around 47 and only dropping a few degrees in the evening. The locals tell us it can get to 60 Celcius in mid summer. All government businesses close at 1 pm and lots of privately owned ones too, so everyone can get out of the heat and have a sleep. There is not much to do during this time so we usually head for the hotel and the air conditioning and catch up on the news, read, do our laundry, do some research or play spider patience on our notebook.







There are only about a handful of women working in the shops and only a few more on the streets. There is a large population of Asian workers from the Indian sub-continent and some have their wives and children with them but most don't. A lot of the restaurants serve Indian and Chinese food and we are enjoying a curry in the evenings.







One of the museums we visited was free and showed old photos of the history of the city. It was another well thought out display with models and dioramas but it was not well attended.







In the evenings the corniche is packed with men sitting drinking juice and chatting with their mates. The Asians toss bread for the fish and throw out their handlines hoping for a bite. Trucks loaded with huge rocks thunder past on their way to the Sultan's palace as it undergoes renovations. Some of the old men sit barefoot on mats playing dominoes and other board games. The grassy areas at the roundabouts are often crowded with men chatting until the early hours of the morning. Unlike Yemen, there don't seem to be many smokers here amongst the men.





The souq has been upgraded and sells jewelery, daggers, perfumes, carpets and incense and burners. There are rows and rows of fabric sellers selling matching sets for saris as well as rows and rows of Asian tailors sewing galabehas for the local men.







The local muslim men wear long-sleeved white dishdash with a little tassle at the neck. They wear an embroidered hat usually of two colours. It seems only the Asian men wear western clothes. A few women cover their faces with veils but most of the young ones don't seem to.





The main road from the airport to the city centre is called Sultan Qaboos Road after the present Sultan. It is lined with beautifully designed modern buildings and several are named after the Sultan such as the huge mosque, the university and a large sports complex.





Typically the private residences are walled and only a couple of storeys high with a tower to hold the water tanks. They include lots of arches, and often crenallations. The air conditioning units are hidden behind ornate grills or incorporated into the overall design so they blend in, even the water tanks have crenallations looking like little look out towers on top of the buildings. The Sultan has put a lot of thought into the architecture of the country.





Many old mud built houses are being knocked down so lots of places lack real character and with everything being so new it is not as interesting wandering around the towns as other places in the Middle East have been.



The shops have interesting signs like: foodstuffs sale, repairing and maintenance of electronic items, or sale of electronic and sanitaryware. There is very little advertising just a description of what business it carries out.

All our Oman photos have been accidentally deleted!