Sunday, October 5th - Visit to Nizwa

Our first weekend of holidays. We didn't do much on Saturday; we went to the souq for a bit but didn't really buy anything as most of the shops were closed for Eid. We met some friends for dinner and had a quiet evening. It was a very relaxing day. On Sunday, we hired a car and a driver and went to Nizwa, one of the oldest cities in Oman, located inland about two hours from Muscat. The drive there and back was pretty nice as most of it was in the mountains. Nizwa is a major date producer and has a lot of history as it was the capital of Oman way back in the 600 - 700 AD. We visited their fort, which was originally built in the 1600. It has a lot of history and the visit was quite interesting. It was also interesting to visit their Souq, as we found a lot of pottery and things that we hadn't really seen eslsewhere in Oman, or in the Middle East, for that matter. Finally, we visited the bottom part of a falaj. A falaj is an irrigation system that takes the water from the mountain and brings it down to the valley through a system of dams. This one was over 30 km long. It was quite impressive to see the human ingenuity involved in the building of such an extensive system. We came back to Muscat before 6 pm and went out for dinner with our friends again. It was a very nice evening.

On our way to Nizwa - things grow where there is water!

Entrance to the souq

Pottery - we don't really see that kind of pottery in Muscat

The Fort of Nizwa

Palm trees, behind the Fort

Nizwa

One of the many towers found all over Oman

A part of the falaj

The flow of water is being diverted to different places

The wall is made of mud

So is the house!