Falaj Daris Hotel Nizwa

During the course of my work it is necessary for me to visit the hotels and resorts that are included in my company's holiday programme – Luxury Hotel Holidays.



Luxury Hotel Holidays is an independent specialist tour ...

After a few days at sea where we basically rested up and had a few drinks on the back deck in the shade, but still very hot, we arrived in Mina Qaboos at 6.45am. It didn't look very exciting from the ship but we got on the shuttle bus (which we all had to pay AU$7 each one way) and it only took us about 1 klm and then we got off at the markets. Everything was closed but they gradually started opening the little shops up as we walked around the ...

It works! The engineer has been beavering away on our engine and at last it runs perfectly. It turns out the previous owner had barely used the boat in the past year and the whole thing needed a good clean out.


Finally we managed to get the family out and had our first adventure on the high seas. We didn’t go far, just 15 mins around the coast to a little ...

... why nobody mentioned the fact that instead of a smooth, well defined tarmac road stretching off into the distance, majestically climbing the mountain in long elegant sweeps, we were now bumping along a rough gravel track towards a deep cleft in a vertical wall rising 4000' above us. But press on we did, and for a good while it was a fantastic experience. For the first few miles the track runs along the dry wadi, flanked by lush date palms with the almost vertical canyon ...

So, today I got a ride to the Conference intending to sort out my screwed up schedule and see what trips I could manage to take still. I really wanted to see Nizwa but when I got to the tour desk, was informed that it had already left. *SIGH* So, I grabbe the laptop I had wisely brought intending to get online and update the blogs but ran into Peter, a nice older gentleman from Australia that I hadd ridden from the hotel with and he said, "Are you coming to Nizwa?" So, obviously it ...

We got up and had breakfast at the hotel.  Luckily there was lots of coffee as I desperately needed some of that.:-) Once we had eaten, Nizwa Fort was our destination for the day.  Mubina said it was amazing to see and that the Souk was good for shopping.  Darn. As we drove around, I was amazed at how organized this country was!  Up until 15 years ago, there had only been about 10 miles of paved road in the entire country but now the entire has amazing roads.  People ...

... Friday prayers at lunch time. At the foot of Jabal Shams mountain we entered a very well developed cave run by an Omani-Lebanese company. The cave is 5km long and famous for some lakes which are home to blind fish.The rock formation and the shear size of the interior is breath-taking. The guide was nice but not comparable to guides in touristically developed areas. Will be on my way to Bombay tonight.

I hit Nizwa, a town in the mountainous inland part of Oman (to distinguish it from the mountainous coastal part) at night, well after dark. So it wasn't really until the next morning that I really knew where I was. Mountains dotted the horizon as I drove into the centre of the city to look at, well, what I look at in every city (in Oman at least); the souk, the fort and the mosque. This was a special souk, though; it was a livestock souk, and much ...

We woke up early determined not to be so lazy and actually see some of the country. We headed back to the Ruwi bus station and took the early bus to Nizwa. Nizwa was about two hours from Muscat and is known for its several century old for as well as its palm tree studded mountains. There is also really nifty monument to books in the middle of a traffic circle. The castle was built around 900 A.D. on the site of a ...

Trying to post pics 1st. Hopefully I'll get back to the updates... Back in Stockholm now & put up some more pics. Oman was great, but I think an even better way to see the country would be to rent a car for 2-3 weeks and driver yourself around. The roads are good, though you need 4WD for some things. People are friendly & helpful & I found the country very safe. I think there is probably a slightly untapped (though not for long) market for more adventurous & ...