Two Mirages, a Castle and a Fort

Fancy a burger from this place?

One of a number of new built identical police stations that are apparently undermanned.

An abaya shop.

A perfume bar

A huge selection of fruit and vegetables from around the world.

And nuts and spices.

The huge LuLu Market

The 'Oman Across Ages' Museum.

The cavernous entrance hallway to the museum.

A beautiful display of all things Omani.

I really liked this painting, but I don't know anything about it.

Unbelievably spacious museum

The building is spectacular is size...

and design.

Jabreen Castle

The massive Nizwa Fort.

And some original old buildings beneath its protective walls. 

Part of an existing ancient irrigation aqueduct.

Monday, February 23rd.

Okay not really mirages, that’s an attention grabber, but after being in the desert and living bedouin style, today really did seem other worldly. We had a two hour drive this morning, before our first stop at the Grand Mall where we stopped to buy lunch supplies. The mall was big, but the LuLu Hypermarket was HUGE! It was as big as a Costco or Walmart if not bigger. It had everything, and this in a town in the middle of the desert! From there we drove to a brand new museum that is called the ‘Oman Across Ages Museum’. The building is thoroughly modern, immaculate and HUGE! It has the most open space airy environment I’ve ever seen in a museum and the least number of artifacts per square metre of any museum I’ve ever been in. It is basically a very large, expensive advertisement for Oman and sings the praises of the Sultan who ruled from 1970-2020. So, that’s what I mean by mirages, neither of these places felt right in this environment or this country. Absolutely bizarre.

After that we returned to some sort of normality and visited an old castle and a fort. The Jabreen Castle is a 350 year old massive castle which has a total of 55 rooms. It was built in 1670 by Imam Bil’arab bin Sultan Al Ya’arubi during a period of prosperity in Oman. The Imam personally financed its construction and it is known for its regal chamber adorned with intricately carved ceilings. Then we visited Nizwa Fort which was built over 12 years in the 17th century by the same Sultan, who was the first Imam of the Yaruba dynasty. The fort is famed for its distinctive 40m tall round tower. Our last visit of the day was to see a portion of the irrigation channel that runs through Nizwa and waters the farms of the area. Without it Nizwa would not be famous for its agricultural products including pomegranates, walnuts, apricots, black  grapes and peaches.

We checked into the beautiful and massive Golden Tulip Hotel in Nizwa (which is owned by a Chinese company). Nizwa was formerly the capital city of Oman before that title was moved to Muscat. Nizwa was inland and more easily defended, but as they became more secure as a country, the coastal city of Muscat became more appropriate especially as the Sultan lived there. It took about ten minutes for me to dump my stuff and enjoy the big pool with Steve and Andy. Dinner was buffet style in the hotel. I was sitting with George, Cam and Jane and for the first time we had a beer at dinner! A strange incident happened then. Our guide Mousad came to our table with a bowl of soup and was talking to George when an expat maitre'd came up to him and said that Muslims cannot be in that room. He looked at her (dressed in his dishdasha and kummah - robe and hat), and said ‘who told you I am a Muslim?’ What a great line! Apparently because there was alcohol on the table they felt he was not to be there. Shortly after we all headed back to our rooms for the night.