Ok, we're now getting in to NGS's typical flow - early morning starts! Today it was breakfast at 6am, out the door, on the bus, wheels up by 6:30am. We were off to explore the Oman coast and hike the Wadi Shab Canyon. Basically, a Wadi is a canyon with a river flowing through it. Given that Oman is pretty well all desert, Wadi's stand out because things grow there and locals farm around there. This Wadi, about 2hrs south east of Muscat, is particularly picturesque and has lagoons of crystal clear water where you can swim.
Fist things first:
The hike was about 30 minutes through the canyon to the lagoon where you could swim. In the shade it was quite cool. in the sun you got fried alive. Along the way we began photographing Malik, our tour guide in Oman. He had graciously agreed to be our "model" for the duration so you'll see him pop up in photos as we go along.
Some folks were crazy enough to leap in.
But Carol and I were sensible enough to stay dry.
We then hiked back out of the canyon by which time it was getting seriously hot. We made a brief stop at a local village - Tiwi, took some photos and then went to lunch at Wadi Shab Resort. Calling it a resort was a bit of a stretch but it did have a nice view of the Indian Ocean.
We then headed back to Qantab for some late afternoon photography.
We photographed anybody who would let us (not everybody). There were locals but also fisherman from Pakistan and Bangladesh who were cooling off in the sea.
The kids generally ran away when they saw strange looking people with cameras, but one didn't.
