Happy Women’s Day! Another day dedicated to women. (OK, Valentine’s is for both sexes, but …from observation, I think it mostly works one way, ahem. When will men ever get a day of their own?)
Here’s a flower farm trip that was really nice, and one which we loved! So much so, that we went back for a second round, within 4 months! Welcome to Jebel Akhdar (or literally Green Mountain in Arabic) of Oman! Here goes, a picture post.
Jebel Akhdar is a mountainous plateau in northern Oman, about umm… 6 hours drive from our home in Dubai. One thing to note is that you have to have a 4WD car to drive up to Jebel Akhdar. (Why? Just because they say so. Nah, I think it’s for safety when descending the steep roads). There’s a police checkpoint at the foot of Jebel Akhdar where they check your car for 4-wheel-drive capabilities. If your car doesn’t have 4WD, hard luck! You’d have to park at the foot of the hill, and take a cab up, or hire a 4WD car. Our trusty ol’ Hyundai Tucson has All-Wheel-Drive (AWD) and we’re through! Here we come, mountains! We love mountains, by the way!
This my friend, is Jebel Akhdar in Dec 2022. The farms, which are on terraces cut into the steep hillside, go all the way down almost to the wadi below.
There’re 3 hillside villages which people trek through, although you could trek all the way down and even further. The villages are Al Aqur (left, nearest), Al Ain (right) and Al Shuraijah (middle, furthest)
The valley showing a village further below, Al Qusha. The building on the top right, near the ledge is said to belong to a prince of Qatar
Al Sharaf Old House, Al Aqur village. This is an old house which is opened for tourists. There’s a small fee if I remember correctly, but you’ll learn about how people make rose water, the main industry in this area, visit all the rooms in the house and try some local coffee. But December isn’t the rose season… So there’re no roses to see, or process. And that last comment, my wife remembered quite clearly, which is why we visited Jebel Akhdar a second time, hehe
We started our trek from Al Aqur village which is the nearest village to the main town in Jebel Akhdar where the hotels are. Fancy some qahwah? A coffee break at Al Sharaf Old House, Al Aqur Village, Jebel Akhdar
The trails are prominently marked with a paint work of red, white and yellow. If you see that marking, you’re on the right track. Approaching Al Ain village, where the bigger farms are! Yippee!
Somewhere after Al Ain village. There’s a trail that goes from Al Ain to Al Shuraijah, but I think this one goes down to Al Qusha below. I’m not sure, as this was the extent that we went before turning back to our car in Al Aqur. (Our phones ran out of batteries incidentally. What’s the use of having all the fun and not taking photos?) The farms are a little yellow as you can see as it wasn’t flower season (and because the photos were taken on my old Samsung 7 phone which still contained …a teeny little bit of battery. Anu’s was completely drained…)
Know why we went back in April now? …Flower season! Jebel Akhdar in April 2023, much greener as you can see!
Us in Jebel Akhdar, April 2023
It’s a long way to fall…
Honey, be careful, will ya?
Enjoying the sunset in Jebel Akhdar. See ya!
No comments:
Post a Comment