The History of the City, the Country and the Faith

Our guide Thamer showing where we are going.

The Al-Masmak fort.

The women buying suitable attire.

The ruins of the 

Here's a switch, she wanted to take a photo of us.

One of the local guards who happily posed for me.

An Incense boy and a water server.

The public library with thousands of fabric shades.

Fascinating artchitecture from the coach.

Public Investment Funds (PIF) Tower

The view from the Skywalk of the PIF building.
 

Monday, January 19th.

I woke up at 6am which was dark with a temperature of 13 outside going to a sunny high of 24. No sign of my roommate yet. I had breakfast at the included buffet and read until our meeting time with our tour leader Yunnas at 8:45. My roommate was to be a 89 year old German gentleman who cancelled out at the last minute. I hope he is okay… but now I have my own room. Our Explore guide is named Yannis and he is from France and has been leading tours in Saudi Arabia during the temperate season since Saudi opened to tourism in 2021. His briefing gave us the particulars we need about dress (long pants and long sleeves for women and short sleeves are okay for men) and the basic itinerary. He introduced us to our local Arabic guide, Thamer, who will be with us for the day. Our first stop was a short walk from the hotel to Al-Masmak, an historic fort that played an important role in the history of Saudi. We learned a lot about the history of the three kingdoms of Saudi Arabia today, way too much to relate here and some of which I might include in my summary at the end of the trip. Suffice to say, that one ruling family was exiled and years later the son came back and recaptured the kingdom with only 40 soldiers. This event happened at this fort and marks the beginning of the third kingdom. Then we walked to a local bazaar where the women had to buy a long djellaba to wear in religious sites later on the trip.

From there the fifteen of us (plus two guides) boarded our large 50 seater brand new coach and drove to the new National History Museum which outlines the history from ancient times and the arrival of people. Riyadh means ‘oasis’ in the old language and explains why people settled here in the first place hundreds of kilometres from the sea in the middle of the desert. We were informed of the history of the ruling families and how poor, isolated and third world it was, until the 1950’s when oil became predominant world wide. From that point on the country has developed and built Riyadh from a city of 50 000 to the modern sprawling megalopolis of nearly 9 million people. Included in our history course was the coming of the Prophet (peace and blessings upon him) and the history of Islam. 

We drove to our lunch stop which was a nice local, modern, fast food restaurant. I had a stuffed falafel plate with fresh veggies and humus. Then we were off to an historic site recognized by UNESCO called Diriyah. It was a royal palace area from 150 years ago which was destroyed by the invading Ottomans. It has been reconstructed to its former state using 3 million mud and straw bricks constructed in the traditional way. Again we were given a history course of the country, the royals and the faith. Our guide was an excellent story teller. (coincidentally he had lived in Toronto for two months in 2005 as a foreign student living in a homestay to learn English. He could have been a student living with me and my son!). From there we boarded our coach again, got stuck in traffic, and made our way to the tallest building in Riyadh, the Public Investment Funds (PIF) Tower, it looks like a large bottle opener. We took two elevators up to the 99th floor for a spectacular night time view of the city. Then we took the newly constructed subway 9 stops back to our hotel to avoid spending another hour on the coach in traffic. This city is growing quickly and there are dozens of cranes and multiple large construction sites as it looks like they are remodelling whole areas. At the hotel I walked with Darren to a money exchange with I traded $125US for 465 Saudi riyals. The walk there was very interesting as we walked across uneven sidewalks, stairs, rubbish on the roads, feral cats, past numerous shops selling all manner of stuff and about six washing machine repair shops where they were doing the work on the sidewalks. It reminded me very much of India, very different for the areas we were in today. Then back to the hotel by 8:30 for the night.