One of my favourite ever adventures was conducted over a Bank Holiday weekend whilst living in Oman. I was enraptured by the Wahiba Sands (also called Sharqiya) the first time we visited – a beautiful, archetypal sand sea some 60 miles wide and 100 or so high. On the recommendation of a friend, we decided to try and cross it on foot.
Here’s our story told in pictures.
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We parked our car at the edge of the first dune, loaded our packs with water, and headed east into the sand.
We walked in socks for much of the way, using our shoes at night for scorpion protection.
Apparently all of the camels in the Wahiba belong to someone but they felt pretty wild to us when we came across them.
The sun and heat were unrelenting…
…so we sheltered beneath trees and our tarpaulin in the middle of each day.
It was impossible to get any rest when the wind picked up though as sand filled our eyes, ears, noses and mouths.
The shutter on my camera didn’t work too well with sand in but resulted in this cool effect.
We timed our trip to coincide with a full moon which meant that we could walk at night when it was cooler.
We had counted the number of dunes on Google Earth before we departed…
…but they just seemed to go on and on…
…and on…
…and on!
By the time the sun rose on the final morning, we were dog tired and very thirsty…
…so as we crested the final dune and saw a flat expanse ahead of us…
…we were pretty pleased with ourselves!
Just the small matter of a couple of miles of gravel plain to cross…
…a hitch hike along the road…
…and we could fill our stomachs with every kind of liquid available from the nearest shop.
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You can read more about our Wahiba crossing here.
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