How to Free a 4x4 from a Foot of Loose Sand and Other Desert Survival Techniques (or 96 Hours in Oman)

Before you question the camel intro, because the two of us are living in Nicaragua, let me preface this post with a brief explanation. We spent a couple weeks visiting our friend Nadir in Oman last October. We are just now getting around to posting on the experience. Uh… We’ve been very busy. Please enjoy.

Most people we speak with about our travel experiences in Oman have an initial reaction of “Oman, where is that?” followed frequently with “why would you go there?” As if either of those two responses is not a good enough reason to make Oman your next travel destination, we can attest to the bounty of natural beauty this isolated little Gulf Arab state has to offer.

Think lush green canyons dotted with date palm groves and quiet little villages pinned between the Arabian Sea and awesome rugged Hajar mountains. Hot? The word was redefined for us somewhere after 110 degrees, in the shade. But scorching temperatures didn´t prevent us from having an amazing time. In fact, we learned that in Oman the heat had strange way of playing to our advantage (read on).

One of the highlights of our visit was a four day camping trip, which was an opportunity to set out from the cool luxury of our friend Nadir´s air conditioned apartment in the capital city of Muscat, and his hospitality, which included introducing us to many of his friends and local restaurants. With the keys to our rented 4x4 in hand, we set off with carte blanche to crash almost anywhere we pleased-- thanks to Oman’s friendly laws that allow you to camp on ANY government land, which happens to make up most of the country outside the capital. Right on!

After a late morning start out of Muscat on our first day we headed directly inland toward Nizwa and into the Hajar mountains to see three nearby forts. By far the most interesting was the remote 17^th century Jabrin Fort with maze-like twisted interior hallways and staircases, designed to both protect it from potential invaders and to maintain separate living quarters for the estranged Imam, whose striking private prayer rooms and salons were decorated with ornately painted ceilings and intricately woven rugs. So much for the simple life.

After a long day of sightseeing in blistering heat, we were relieved to drive up into the mountains near Jebal Shams, Oman’s second highest peak, to scope out the perfect place to camp. Finding a quiet spot wasn´t hard, there was no one around save for a few houses scattered along the dirt road climbing the mountain, so we looked for a location with the perfect view that was far enough off the road to feel comfortable. By the time we found the one, we were racing the setting sun as we set up our tent in the gorgeous twilight that made huge silhouettes of the peaks all around us.

It was shortly after this point, when a tastey meal was almost within grasp, that we realized the butane canisters we picked up in Muscat didn´t fit our camping stove. *%$#!! We settled for a dinner of PB&J and tang and were still happy to cool off in the desert night.

The next morning we were up before the sun came over the peaks to the east, and we watched anxiously as the light crept across the valley below us toward our tent. With the direct sun comes blazing temperatures, even early in the morning. Because of this, we wanted to hike early to see Oman’s ‘Grand Canyon’ before heading back down the mountain. The morning effort was definitely worth it, as was the views from the trail we followed along the edge of the canyon. Striated pink, brown, orange and yellow rocks glowed in the low angled light. But by 9:00, the heat dulled the color of the rocks, which began to feel like hot embers, so we turned around and picked our way back over the lip of the canyon towards the truck and the valley below.

We made one last stop before leaving the mountains, in the tiny cliff-hanging hamlet of Misfat Al-Abriyeen. As we climbed up the neighboring valley, above us we saw Misfat, which looked from afar like an island of green clinging to the side of a parched desert canyon. After skirting a couple mule drawn carts along the narrow single lane into town, we parked where the road ended, in the shade of a massive twenty foot bolder, and started wandering through the warren of alleyways that wind around the ancient adobe houses, ducking low archways and circling pools of water where local children spashed cold water.

What keeps Misfat green and similarly provides an attraction, is a complex system of falaj’s (narrow open aquaducts) that draw water from the nearby wadi (riverbed/canyon), and direct it into hundreds of stone terraced date palm groves and various open cisterns. The local farmers control the flow of water throughout the system by jamming large stones and rags into the gaps that lead from the main arteries into smaller spillways. Seeing the system in action is quite a sight. Occasionally the growing sound of gurgling water would make us start and we would watch as a trickle of water in a dry spout would grow to a full-on torrent. Moments later the water would subside without ever revealing the farmer controlling the flow. A bit ghostly…

After wandering through the date palm groves and streets of Misfat for a couple hours, we realized we’d better get moving if we were going to make the long drive to the coast by dark. We set off south along the western edge of the Hajar range, and gazed in awe as the barren expanse of sand dunes, the Wahiba Sands, rose on our right in tones of orange and yellow.

To say that life in this part of Oman is isolated is an understatement. After passing our 100^th camel crossing sign, and 10^th camel, we started trying to see if we could catch the ultimate in photo ops, a camel crossing the road in front of a camel crossing sign (no the heat wasn’t getting to us, we were sitting comfortably in AC). Even though we were unsuccessful, it did provide a diversion from the harsh landscape, just as we probably did, stopped on the side of the road taking pictures of street signs, for the Omani’s passing us at 100 mph.

After a long afternoon driving southwest, a few missed turns, and some challenging efforts to get directions, we finally made it to the isolated entrance gate of the sea turtle nesting beach and our next camp site in Ras-al-Jinz. We were the only guests in the campground, so after we set up our tent, we had a warm bite courtesy of the gatekeeper’s gas range. After dinner we headed off in the dark toward the beach with a few guides and a group of European families who had appeared out of nowhere in a procession of rented trucks. We were not allowed to use lights of any kind because they confuse the turtles as to the location of the ocean, their home.

After waiting awhile as the guides carefully searched the beach, one led us to sand pit where a mother turtle had just finished laying eggs. We stood silently and watched as she slowly paddled at the sand, lunged toward the surf, and finally swam off into the darkness. A few minutes later, another guide led us to a place the beach where a nest was hatching. We gathered around a seemingly uninteresting spot, when suddenly tiny green turtles materialized from the sand by the dozens, flapping away with their little flippers, intent on making it out to the open sea where there chances for survival are much higher. The guides let each of us carry a baby turtle to the water and told us to place it in the surf beyond the line of crabs patrolling the waters edge looking for dinner. The guides also collected turtles, totalling more than a hundred, in a shopping bag and escorted them past the crabs, who we could see, waiting with their eyes up and their pinchers out.

We were allowed to return to the beach at dawn, so we rose the next morning in the dark and watched the sun rise out of the Arabian Sea. As we strolled the beach we discovered a lone baby turtle trying to make its way to the ocean. Another family found the nest and collected the rest of the baby turtles. Turtles that emerge from their nests after dawn have almost no chance of surviving the crustaceans, sea birds and other daylight predators, so we were asked to bring them back to a small pool set up by the rangers near the entrance gate, where the little green grey reptiles are raised until they can be released in a stronger state under the protection of darkness.

After a late night and early morning turtle watching, we were underslept and hot. Without a stove to boil water, we were without a Lipton tea caffeine fix, and a bit cranky. That´s when we had a moment of clarity, and realized that we could use the brutal sun to our advantage to make sun tea! We stuffed a 2l water bottle with 4 or 5 tea bags and stuck it in the back window of the truck to steep. With the thought of freshly brewed tea to look forward to, we set off.

Looking for relief from the early heat we decided to find a quiet swimming beach, far from the nesting site, where we could relax and cool off in the ocean. We drove into the next town north along the coast, Ras-al-Haad, which sits on the tip of a peninsula, the furthest eastern point in Oman where the coast turns up from the Arabean Sea toward the Persian Gulf.

As we rolled through town, we realized our hopes of finding a nice beach where two western tourists could relax and take a dip might be harder than originally thought. The village had an eerie feel and there was almost no one on the street save for a three woman talking with their heads close, wearing black abayas with full veils including a barely translucent dark fabric over their faces to see through. Not the kind of place you feel comfortable stripping down into a bikini or board shorts and going for a dip. So we continued through to the far side of town to look for an deserted beach.

North east of town, a wide flat beach, near an abandoned air strip, extended for several miles up the coast. We drove out across the airstrip and toward the water, and settled on a spot amongst a group of fishing boats drying between their pre-dawn and early evening runs. Though we were separated from town by at least a couple miles of flat white sand we still felt it necessary to back the truck up nearly to the surf so we could get changed under cover--the last thing we wanted to do was offend. The water felt fantastic. Cool, calm, and extremely clear. Everything we were looking for.

We relaxed in the shade of the truck a while before deciding to make a move. After changing and getting into the truck, we shifted the gear into 4 wheel low and turned on the engin to head out. As we applyed the gas, the truck jerked forward and then back, settling into the soft white sand with tires spinning. The two of us felt our heart sink into our stomachs. %#&$”!! We tried putting the truck in reverse, forward, no respnse. We thought about our situation. Thankfully we were a safe distance up from tide and more importanly, we had a truck full of water and food, and wouldn´t dehydrate before fisherman came back. On the other hand it was well over 100 degrees with the reflection of the sun off the sand and water making it feel much worse. We had to figure out how to free a truck with both its axles completely buried in loose sand.

Melanie made the ingenious discovery of a ´dummies guide to what to do if you´re stuck in sand´ that was conveniently printed on the back of our tourist road map of Oman. Basically the introduction said: ¨We know a lot of you visitors can´t resist the endless miles of sand and go off roading. We do it too. The only difference is that we know how. When you get stuck, please, try the following steps. If they don´t work, please, don´t call.¨We went to work on the first few suggestions, positioning wood planks (driftwood) under the wheels, and digging out the axles. We took turns, Stephen shoveling away large piles of sand with an sand zambony modeled from a piece of wood, and Melanie, on her belly, digging out sand from deep under the truck axles. After about two hours of digging and many water breaks, the two of us were exhausted, hot and covered head to toe in sand. We had made a lot of progress and the axles were mostly exposed, but we both feared another failed attempt at starting the car would put us back at the beginning, two feet under burning hot sand. Out of the shimmering heat a 4x4 with oversized tires drove up out of nowhere and screeched to a halt about 20 yards back from the water--on firmer sand.

A nice looking Omani guy in traditional white dishdash jumped out, and before we could explain anything, he quickly shuffled over to our truck, grabbed the keys out of Stephen´s hand, gave us a nod and hopped in. He waved at us to stand back, and put the truck in gear. Revving the engine high, he began to alternate in forward and reverse, forward and reverse, until with a little help from our pushing (we like to think), he finally got the truck to move forward of the sand trenches about ten feet, at which point we both breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Then he threw the truck in in reverse and sped backward towards the ocean. We nearly had a collective heart attack envisioning the truck bubbling to the bottom of the ocean. Inches from surf he slammed on the breaks. He threw the truck into forward and drove off down the beach along the edge of the surf, all the while the two of us standing there helpless.

Then he stopped, turned the truck around and waved his hand out the window for us to get out of the way. We did. He accelerated back up the hard packed sand, toward us, and at about 35 mph, swerved the truck into the loose sand where we had gotten stuck, sending up huge spray of sand.The truck literally flew across the beach, the whole vehicle bouncing forward and backward as it piled through the loose section and on over to firmer ground.

He pulled the truck round, parked it next to his own and hopped out. We ran over, hands pressed together in thanks, praising him profusely. He nodded, smiled and said something nice sounding in Arabic (which for all we know translates to something like, ´stupid #$%&! tourists´). We offered him a gift for his help, a pair of earrings for his wife that Melanie had made in New York for just this sort of occasion. He smiled graciously and was off… and so were we after one more dip in the ocean to clean all the sand out of ears and hair (in Melanie´s case at least).

From that point on, everything got a lot easier. We drove into the next town north and ate lunch in the coolness of our air conditioned vehicle overlooking a beautiful lagoon filled with wooden dhows, an ancient boat model still being used. (Being Ramadan we couldn´t eat in public anyways.) We were thrilled to get an afternoon boost from the sun-tea that was warm and well steeped, and we were so pleased with the results that we decided to take the idea a step further and try the same method on ramen noodles for dinner.

After lunch we drove around the lagoon and into Sur, where we stopped at a dhow ship yard where the friendly craftsmen invited us in to watch them shape hulls. Later that afternoon, we drove further up the coast, looking to the cliffs on the west for a good camping spot. Luckily, this time when we drove off the highway and up into the rocky hillside, we did not get stuck. We set up camp overlooking the ocean while the sun set at our backs. The noodles that we had set aside to cook in the sun were fantastic.

After dinner, we laid down on a large flat rock that was still warm from the sun, and watched the stars. It´s still a moment we think about often, sitting there in the cool night on that warm rock, staring at the stars.

The next day we continued driving north along the coast to Muscat, stopping along the way at two waddis and a deep swiming hole to cool off in clear emerald swimming pools. The highlight was in Waddi Shab, where two local boys asked to lead us through a chain of shallow pools and deep into a canyon to a partially submerged cave and waterfall. After our experience the previous day, receiving such honest and kind assistance on the beach and being shown around the boat yard, we trusted them and took them up on the offer.

Wow, were we rewarded. The cave they led us to required us to swim in through an opening just wide enough to keep our heads above water. Inside, shafts of sunlight reflected off the upper walls of the cave, which had been smoothed by flowing water. The kids led us into little areas under the water level where you could pop your head up in tiny emerald colored rooms that were illuminated by the sun reflecting through the water. The experience was amazing.

Later that day as we drove back into Muscat watching the last rays of sun play off the cliffs and the deep green ocean, we were more than satisfied. Suffering through the setbacks and tight situations made the rewards that much sweeter. And of course, we reminded each other just how lucky we were to be there.