Anniversary Celebration in Oman

We apologize for the lack of posts lately, i guess life just caught up to us.  We went to bed last night at 10 and didn't wake up until 9:30, and then both took 3 hr naps this afternoon.

As for our life over the past couple of weeks, the most exciting thing was our first vacation since we've been here.  We finally celebrated our anniversary by going to Muscat, Oman.  We really enoyed our time.  The landscape there is really beautiful--it's so green and the jagged mountains are gorgeous.

Typical Omani landscape.

We spent the first day mainly at the beach which was interesting.  We went first just to the public beach, but all the women were in their full head to toe garb so I didn't really fill comfortable stripping down to my bikini.

View of the public beach that we went to first
from the hotel that we went to second.

I ended up wearing a tank top and long board shorts.  After that we went to a nearby hotel where we sat at their pool and looked down along the coastline.

Relaxing at the hotel looking out over the coastline

 
That night Paul took me out for a romantic dinner at The Chedi which is one of the really nice resorts in Muscat.  We sat outside and had a drink while waiting for our table--the weather was perfect and it was just so peaceful and relaxing.  The meal was great too--I would highly recommend the Chedi if you ever make it to Muscat :)

Anniversary celebration dinner at the Chedi.

The next day we decided to drive inland about 2.5hrs to Nizwa and the Saqh Plateau.  It was a really pretty drive although a bit stressful for my driver (paul) as the roads were crazy steep and narrow.  Before you can actually start going up the mountain there is a military checkpoint where they stop you and make sure that you have 4-wheel drive before they let you continue.

There were tons of wild goats along the road on our drive up
the mountain.  I had a lot of fun taking photos of them.

I think that this day was my favorite part of the trip.  I just liked being in the mountains with such nice weather and out of the touristy areas.  We got to go to a little town called Al Ayn where there are literally just a few families living there that have lived there for years...it was really hard to imagine what it would be like to grow up in a town like that.  We decided to venture into the little village and we saw one girl walking up with metal trays and bowls on her head--it was like something you would see in National Geographic.  Unfortunately I didn't ask if I could take her  picture.  We walked around some more looking at their little farm and aquaducts and then two more young girls came by carrying things on their heads--I asked if I could take their picture but their answer was a definite "no."  Oh well.

View from Al Ayn

While we were there we ran into a tour group of people from Austria, and Paul, being the friendly person he is, started talking to the guides.  We ended up following them to our next stop which was a Wadi with an old abandoned village.  We hiked around there a bit, it was really beautiful with the sunset.

The abandoned village that we hiked to is
behind us and the wadi below.

Abandoned village that we hiked through

A similar village that we could see across the Wadi

On our way back from the Wadi, we saw these boys on the side
of the road selling pomegranates.
Of course we had to stop and get some :)

The next day before we left we stopped by the old souk in Muttrah.  It took some convincing to get Paul to come, but I'm pretty sure he bought more stuff than I did :)  One of the things that Oman is known for is Frankincense--I always wondered what it smelled like, we ended up smelling some of it, and it was a little citrusy smelling, but I wouldn't say that either of us would want to have it as a fragrance in our house.  We bought some pashminas, soccer jerseys, silver jewelry, a dish dash & an abaya (local clothing), among some other treasures :)

Paul with some of our finds at the Souk in Muttrah

Overall, it was a great trip.  Nice to get away from some of the sand for a while.  Also, the locals there were so much nicer than the Emiratis--much less arrogant and stuck up.  I think if we had a choice of whether to live in Abu Dhabi or Muscat we would definitely choose Muscat.  If you want to see more photos, go to our facebook album.

As for our next trip, we just decided a few days ago to go to Nepal for Eid.  We're pretty excited about the trip.  It was a pretty spur of the moment decision so there's still some planning to do, but we're looking forward to getting out of the sand and heat (although the weather is wonderful now) for a few days and being able to wear a few layers, going hiking, and seeing Mt. Everest!  I'm sure we'll have many stories and photos to share upon our return :)