Move over Europe and America, the Middle East has become the hotspot for any discerning traveller. And whilst many may flock to the commercial haven of Dubai the more intrepid explorer is looking to its neighbour, Oman.

Steeped in 6000 years of history & culture, stunning mountainous landscapes and all surrounded by 1700km of coastline Oman is unique to the region. As a result the country has put itself firmly in the top ten-destination wish list for visitors in less than four years.

To step inside and experience Oman’s history why not visit the Khasab Fort? Built in the 17th century, the picturesque stronghold is situated on the inner cove of Khasab Bay in Wilayat Khasab –Musandam.

Those seeking pampering over history may wish to try the five-star Al Nahda Resort and Spa that uses the traditions of Ayurveda as well as modern disciplines and therapies. For the Tiger Woods in you why not tee off at Oman’s first PGA 18-hole course at Airport Heights, Seeb?

To find out what other jewels of attraction Oman has to offer join Alison Cryer and journalist John Bell with Keith Betton as they take you through the magical country

Oman webchat - Holiday ‘07

H: Keith Betton, host
A: Alison Cryer, Oman tourist office
J: John Bell, travel writer

H: Hello and welcome to Holiday ’07, my name is Keith Betton and this is the program on the internet which allows you to ask my guests about your favourite holiday destinations, and today we’re going to be looking at the second largest country in the whole of Arabia. It’s not been on the tourist map for very long, but it’s now growing very very fast indeed and that is Oman. We’re going to be hearing all about Oman today and if you’ve got question about Oman then get on the internet and send us those questions, and my guests will answer those for you, and my guests today are Alison Cryer from the Oman tourist office and John Bell the well known travel writer, and of course you’ve been there many, many times Alison, John you’ve been a couple of times?

J: Yes and I wish I was back there now

H: Well absolutely, it’s a great destination, so if you’ve got questions about Oman, do get on the Internet and send them in and we’ll give you the best answer we can because we’ve got the experts here. So let’s just first of all, Alison, talk about Oman as a destination, I mean as you arrive there, what kind of a climate has it got and is it going to be hot and sticky straight away or is sometimes the temperature really much lower than you’d expect?

A: It certainly depends what time of year you go, at this time of year it’s a nice, hot climate, it is humid so you do feel the heat as you arrive, but it’s no different to Dubai and lots of people find the Dubai temperatures in the summer are very pleasant for them. It gets cooler as you get into September and October. Best time of year to go is October through to April. If you go up into the mountains of course it’s cool all year round, and if you go down to Salala which is in the south, then it’s even rainy at this time of year, just lightly, nice, soft monsoon rain

H: So monsoon rains really from I suppose July through to September?

A: July through to mid August, yes

H: Ok. Now Geraldine actually asked that question, she also asked what kind of clothes are you allowed to wear? As a woman sometimes in Arabic countries you have to be very careful, is that the case in Oman as well?

A: Well it depends where you are. If you’re in a hotel complex, a resort, you can dress exactly as you would in Europe, it’s no different. If you’re going to some of the religious buildings, if you’re visiting forts or into a Souk, local people then it’s recommended that women do wear sleeves down to their elbows, and dresses down to their knees. Bikinis in town and shorts, it’s just not part of the local culture

H: Absolutely now John you’ve been a couple of times, as a travel writer how did Oman strike you compared to other countries within the Middle East?

J: Well one word I really hate using is unique, but it is and it’s – when you get off the plane it’s just not what you expect – you have this terrible idea about middle eastern country, it’s not like that at all. I found it very easy to get around for instance, here’s one thing, I found it incredibly clean, that was my – if you ask me my first impression when I walked out of the airport I thought there’s no litter anywhere. This is a bit like, and it’s often said to me, a bit like a hot Switzerland funnily enough

H: Yes. So lots of mountains of course, tremendous coastline, we’ve got a question here from Simone, she says what is the best time? Now Alison you’ve indicated a time when it is a bit damper but I imagine winter is probably the comfortable time in terms of temperature and mid summer is pretty hot, but just how hot does it get?

A: Well it can get as far as 45, 50 degrees if you’re out in the desert in the summer because it is the desert and it’s very hot at this time of year, it’s usually about 40 in the day going down to about 30 in the height of the summer which will be May, June actually rather than July, August. In the winter it goes to about 30 average high temperature, down to 20 in the sort of lower periods. In the evenings in the winter you do need a cardigan or a sort of pashmina which is something that a lot of local people wear in the evenings

H: Ok so let’s have a feel about the geography about Oman because it is a big place, a lot of sand, so just take us through. Most people are going – well everyone’s going to go I guess to Muscat because that’s where the international flights come into, so as a city, was it that Muscat really has to offer?

A: Well Muscat has a variety of things to offer obviously it has the forts and the historical part of Muscat, there’s the old part of Muscat that used to be where all the people lived until the country was opened up to the outside world 35 years ago, everybody would sleep inside the old walls of Muscat, and inside the old walls of Muscat you’ve got quite a few old mosques, a very nice museum called the Bait al Zubair museum which is a little bit hands on so you can get a flavour of how people used to live, where they used to live, the traditions and some of the tools and things that they’ve used. There’s a lot of other museums and art galleries as well, and then there’s some – there’s the Grand Mosque which I feel is the next Taj Mahal, it’s an amazing building, has the biggest carpet outside of – well in the world I believe it was pieced together, made in Persia, pieced together, sewn up in the Mosque itself and has one of the largest crystal chandeliers imported from Austria inside it, so it’s quite an unusual building, it’s absolutely stunning and it’s really important to visit it if you’re visiting Muscat. And ladies can visit both the men’s mosque and the men’s mosque, and the ladies mosque is smaller and a little bit more of a tradition Omani style, so the wood is, it’s painted wood. If you didn’t know that was traditional Omani painting you might think it was Swiss, but it’s very pretty building as well

H: Ok now John as a travel writer I guess one of the first things you look at is tourist facilities like hotels, so tell us a bit about the hotels in Oman?

J: Impressive is the word that comes to mind. I think I’d probably say the most opulent hotel that I ever stayed in, in my life. Muscat has an increasing number of good hotels, Shangri La’s recently opened, 18 months ago, 600 rooms of 5 and 4 star hotels, slightly out of town, and the Abustar which is the hotel which I was alluding to. I think the only hotel where I will ever ever find a symphony orchestra playing under my feet and when I said well I’ve got to make a broadcast from somewhere in Muscat, they said oh that’s fine, we’ll open one of our studios. This is a hotel

H: Yes I guess it was built by the Sultan for the Sultan so it is his hotel

J: Well the most wonderful thing Keith is that it’s built in style, and I don’t mean the style you expect from a five star, but the style in keeping with the architecture of Muscat, and that’s so unusual and that’s so – an element of local control which I personally rather appreciate

H: Well certainly I think I’ve been twice and the hotels are pretty impressive, and I mean the new, the Al Husn is the new 6 star hotel just up the road from the Abustar, and I mean those – they are really superb, and a lot of people are going to go especially for that experience, the spa experience as well. Now as we travel away from Muscat, where would you go to next, would you go to the south?

A: Well actually I’d go up to Nizwa, which is about an hour and a half. The roads – what we haven’t mentioned is the roads in Oman are fantastic, you can drive all over Oman safely and comfortably as a tourist, with or without a guide, and you could drive yourself to Nizwa, or if wanted a bit more information about where you are, what you’re seeing, what you’re going to find there, it’s obviously better to have a driver guide because then you get that added bonus of having someone that knows the area

H: Ok well I think what we need to do is we need to have a look at a video of Oman so we can get a feel for all these places, it’s an amazing destination so if you’re interested in Oman do send us emails, and now let’s have a look at a video of Oman from top to bottom

Video footage

“My land is beautiful.”

H: Well those were some amazing shots of Oman and if you’re interested in finding out more about Oman then send questions in to my guests today, Alison Cryer and John Bell. Now John, we saw in that bit of video at the end, a four-wheel drive going along a Wadi in the desert, have you done that?

J: Oh yes I have and you saw a four-wheel drive going on a Wadi, actually doing it is completely different. It’s one of the most exciting things I’ve ever done, in that you think oh I’ll just go for a drive down a bit of sand, bit of stone, and you come flying round the corner and there’s a lake in front of you at the right time, and a bit of greenery. The scenery that changes with every turn, because Wadi of course is a joined up river bed, and in fact sometimes you have to keep your eye on the weather that you don’t encounter a lot of water coming in the other direction. But they are a) incredibly peaceful places, and beautiful, and b) exciting because if you ran into the correct gear and take your jeep at a fast rate of knots down a Wadi, Walt Disney’s got nothing on that

H: So even though it’s called Wadi bashing, it’s not really bashing, there’s nothing –

J: No, no

H: Just trying to make sure we’re not smashing up the environment

J: I’m a travel writer so I’m therefore PC, so I have to watch it slightly but yes I did put my foot on the accelerator and I’d recommend it

H: Ok now we’ve got a question here from Peter, he’s asking Alison how popular is Oman with British people, I imagine pretty popular

A: It’s become very popular in the last few years, we now have about 125,000 British tourists each year, and that’s increasing steadily as airlift increases. We have direct flights from London which is very useful, daily flights with British Airways and Gulf Air, the hotels cater for all types of needs, so yes very popular

H: Ok what about for children, is it a good place for children to visit?

A: I took my children there, and that was two years ago, they were about 8 and 9 at the time, and they keep asking to go back, they had an amazing time. They enjoyed Muscat very much because they enjoyed all the different things to do there, the parks, the small theme park for children, all sorts of little museums that you can go and have a look at, but they also went up to Musandem, and they went snorkelling and they really enjoyed the quality of the water there, and then we went down to Salalah and they said they’d never seen so many camels in their lives, so there’s an awful lot of things for children to do and to educate them a little bit as well

H: Yes, no and it’s a very safe place to go as well

A: Very safe

H: Well do keep your questions coming in, lots of people want to ask questions about Oman, clearly a very popular destination. Jim has asked a question, he says “are there restrictions as far as drinking and religious days and so on?” I mean John –

J: I knew you were going to ask me –

H: Well I instinctively –

J: Just because I’m a journalist you would ask me about drinking

H: Just because you’re a journalist yes

J: The answer is yes there are in public, but an excellent choice of wines and drink in the evenings in the hotels. No problem at all

A: And also in the restaurants, there are international restaurants outside of the hotels where they have licenses, and this year the great news is that in actual fact we’ve lifted the ban of drinking alcohol during Ramadam, so long as you’re in international hotels that are allocated, with a new license for Ramadam, you’re able to drink during Ramadam after sunsets

H: So that’s, for the next few years anyway, probably sort of late summer, August or thereabouts isn’t it?

A: Yes, yes

H: Ok so John the drinking and the food and everything else, clearly something that you know a lot about – what would you say is the best kind of food that you experienced?

J: It’s funny you should just mention Ramadam because the last time I was there, I was there in Ramadam, and I thought it added to the experience because a) I was passing through a time in the Middle East when it’s very different, when things happen in a different way, where there are special celebrations in the evening, where the large hotels put up their Ramadam tents where you can go and listen to music and have special food, and I may say never seen people eat so much after sundown in your life before, but then of course there’s special recipes for a Ramadam supper of course and things like that, so I would actually recommend going in Ramadam, the rest of the year wonderful, food – grilled meats, excellent and of course don’t forget the coastline, you’ve got 1700km of coastline, that’s a lot fish to eat, and the fish is fantastic

H: The only thing, the negative thing I found about Ramadam is that because people who are observing Ramadam are not eating, and you know they quite often get quite tired, but apart from that you just feel sorry for them, they’re having a rough time. Now there’s a question here from Tracy, she says “are there still places to go off the beaten track and are they safe?” Now we have talked about Wadi bashing and driving into the desert. It is probably best, I guess, to get a guide to take you than to simply take a four-wheel drive and go off with a map?

A: Yes. Once you are in the desert there aren’t roads and road signs so you really are much more reliant your guides and the directions you get from a guide. I would always recommend going into the desert with a guide. You can do overnight camps, you can go up into the mountains. The tallest mountains are 3,000ft high, so it is along way up there.

H: The Jebel Akhdar.

A: The Jebel Akhdar – the green mountain. Also you can go and look at the canyons, the snake canyons and the green canyons. There are a lot of areas to visit off the beaten track which you would normally do camping, overnight, moving from one place to the other. Yes unless you have friends or you know Oman I would always recommend taking a guide because otherwise you will miss out on things that you don’t know are there.

H: John what about your view of off the beaten track?

J: I think the guide is a bit of a passport really. If I look at my experiences, not just in Oman but generally, the best ones always happen because I have somebody there who actually understands what is going on, or can translate for me. I can recognise a great character and I remember being in the market in Salana, wonderful people, I wanted to talk to them and they wanted to talk to me but we didn’t understand each other. So the guide was just to give that added benefit to the whole occasion. I would recommend a guide.

H: Ok. So which of you two is the scuba diving expert? Dan wants to know – he says “I’d like to go scuba diving. Is it a good place for coral and fishes?”

J: The man I worked with there last time, who is a scuba diving expert, said he had never found better scuba diving in the world. He didn’t actually get to the best bit, which is, I understand, as I have not been there, in the north up in the straits of Hormuz, where I gather the scuba diving and the diving is just fantastic.

H: So let’s talk about Musandam as this is the very top tip of Oman, cut, I believe, from Oman by part of the United Arab Emirates. You can get there on a day trip almost, or just over a day from Dubai.

A: You have flights from Muscat almost daily, it depends on the time of year and that is 45 minutes flight, a very quick flight. It is a longer drive and you are going through a couple of borders, border crossings but it is a straight road and you actually don’t need a guide for that if you don’t want as you can go on your own. You can come from Dubai and it is about a 3 ½ hour drive from Dubai. Again there is a border crossing, in fact I believe at the moment you still don’t need a visa for Oman if you are coming in from Dubai, you can use your Dubai visa.

H: It is sort of known as the fjord land isn’t it? Is that because it is like Norway?

A: The scenery is stunning and it is very different from the rest of Oman. It is quite extraordinary. It is like Norway there are fjords there and there is rock faces that drop into the fjords. There are very deep colours the diving there is fantastic the snorkelling there is fantastic as well. You can go out on dhows over night. That is another way of getting away from it all spending the night on a dhow, or a couple of nights on a dhow going round the fjords. You’ll come across some dolphins you’ll probably come across turtles, and at certain times of the year you may even come across whales but that is normally down on the coast of Muscat.

H: Ok Alison we have a question really that is probably one for you. Julie is asking “Is it the right kind of country for women to travel on their own?”

A: Well I travel there on my own most of the time. The amazing thing about Oman is the people are very genuine, very hospitable. You feel completely safe. Women are very very much respected in Oman. In fact it is the only country in the Middle East that has equal rights for all women of all nationalities, whether they are Omani or not. So I would say it is an absolutely perfect place to travel on your own if you’re a woman.

J: If I can come in and say I have two daughters so I do judge countries very much like your questioner does. I would have absolutely no problem at all with Oman. I was impressed by, when I met members of the government; people in the cabinet, there were women at every level. That was actually rather of a surprise, a nice surprise.

H: The wildlife we have talked about a little bit, with dolphins and turtles and from my own point of view I am interested because there are birds that go through Oman as well. Are there many places where you can go and see wildlife?

A: Yes there are a variety of areas. Obviously the coast, a fabulous thing to do is to get up early in the morning and go dolphin watching. At sometimes in the year you can come across hundreds of dolphins just in one morning. Obviously you have to get up early because they don’t wait for you, so they are not going to hang around, but they are out there having their breakfast in the cool of the morning. Sometimes you will see whales at certain times of the year as well. Inland you have got the Arabian Oryx sanctuary, which is now a UNESCO heritage site. You have to get permission to go, so you have to ask your guide, your local guide or Tour Company, but you can go and visit the Oryx sanctuary. All over Oman there are pockets for sightings of certain birds. If you go down to Sur and just off Sur there is Ra’s al Hadd and that is where the turtles are most known for nesting. Actually if you are in the Shangri-la hotel in their resort they have turtles coming back to their beach to nest and they have guard on the beach to make sure you don’t tread on the eggs.

H: So quickly just to summarise. Oman is an amazing destination. You mentioned Alison British Airways and Gulf Air, fairly easy to get there and quite a lot of Tour operators now going there. If people want more information how can they get that?

A: First of all there is the website which is accessible on the web omangovrnment.gov.om. We have an office in the UK and I am sure our details will be put on the website as well. There are 120 Tour operators in the country that are servicing and programming Oman. We have a list in the office. The Tour operators are usually found on the website too. Last but not least the hotels directly as well as the airlines directly because some people do like to do that. They like to book their own hotel and then book their own flights.

H: Ok well Alison Cryer and John Bell thank you very much indeed for joining me today to talk about Oman. It is an amazing destination, second largest country in Arabia and if you are interested in more information about Oman you have got the website their omantourisim.gov.om. It has been great having you here. Thanks for joining us here on Holiday 07.

Still got a question or comment?

Name

Your question Question

Enter code