We finally got back into the grove on the Emirates Natural History Group. It turns out that during winter the group meets at 9 am on the weekends! YUCK!! But it seems that we have adjusted to the time change.
The first hike was here in Al Ain. It was great to go out to the desert and see NOTHING as far as the horizon. The drive out was along the power pylons then you turn left at one of the cross roads and before you know it you can see nothing. It was awe inspiring. The one thing I was surprised was how hard packed the sand was I had expected it to be really lose sand like when I took my mom out camping in the desert in December. But as I was told the lose sand in this area is blown into the dunes and as long as you do not drive on the dunes it is almost easy enough for a normal car. Well almost as one of the cars in our caravan did get stuck and we had to spend some time digging them out.
The reason we went on the hike and drive in the desert was to spot a prehistoric lizard. I guess these 2 foot long lizards have been around since the dinosaurs but they are dying out as the desert region is being over taken by Dubai etc. The problem is that once you try to move a species to a new part of the desert it puts too much stress on the system and someone loses out. As it was explained to us the desert is at full capacity.
Any way we did not see many animals but we did find tracks for quite a few. We saw gerbil trails and homes, and some fox tracks. We also found a lot of taped up and killed birds (duck, pigeons, seagulls) we were told that the boys do this. They use these birds as live bait for their haws when they are training them.
The best part of the day was Andrew and Ashley’s close encounter with wild camel. A camel herd was wandering though the area and Ashley and Ashley followed anther adult really close to the camels. The camels stopped but did not retreat. The woman they were with went down to a prone position and the kids did as well. Then the camels came up and smelt the woman (she was in front of the kids by a pace or two. It was a really cool experience for the kids.
After this we did some dune driving it was great as it was so wide open I did not have to hold the steering wheel to drive – nothing to run into for 100 miles. Then we ended up in a spring in the middle of the desert only it was too salty. It was so salty the whole place was covered in thick salt crystals. Then it was a short stop on the way back to sight a newborn camel. We also stopped to clean up some trash that was left by the people training the falcons. Sad that they leave their trash in the pristine desert like this.
Day 2 To the Bat Cave!!!
We took a lovely drive out to the mountains of Oman on Saturday. We parked at the rim of a huge Wadi (gorge- dry river bed) then we walked down the entrance of a falaj (water canal-aqueduct) that led right into the mountain. The way the falaj works is that it follows a spring to its source. Over the 4 thousand years (these structures are older than the pyramids) of the running of the system they have had to dig the falaj deeper and deeper as the water table has lowered. The falaj is a basically a dug out cave / canal for the water to flow down. They end up digging right into the mountain and down to 60 to 100 feet deep.
So we went into one of these cave/ canals to go look at bats, geckos and bugs! I was very surprised that the water was long. It was very cold that day and the cave / canal was geo thermally warm but I expected the water to be cold. Sadly I did not bring my camera. Anyway the cave/canal is lighted by shafts up to the ceiling- to the surface. The shafts allow workers on the surface to pull the dirt that is dug out of the bottom of the falaj. Well at some places the shafts are very far apart and it gets absolutely dark I have never been in a darker place in my life. Ashley was a real trooper and did not freak out. Well the cave/canal is only about shoulder with but at some places you had to turn sideways to get by. After about 200 feet we started to see some geckos and bats. The kids loved seeing them. I was worried they would freak out but they were really cute bats. And some of them started to fly around it was really cool to see. After about 300 feet into the mountain we turned around. Now it was so narrow that we had to literally turn around the first person became the last and last person the first. The water got so deep in spots that in the end Ashleys pants were soaking wet. When we got out of the cave she was freezing cold in the 50 weather, so we had to take here to the car to warm up. This meant that she missed the rest of the hike in the Wadi and she was bummed about that.
Andrew and I did some exploring of another falaj in the area that hung to the side of the mountain it was a nice hike and we saw some cool parts of the mountains. We then departed down the mountain to the Wadi (gorge) floor. A nice walk then we followed a stairway up to the mosque. At the mosque we looked at the sun dial and then headed into the oasis itself. It is amazing that they grow dates (you got to have dates), oranges, bananas, mangoes and many other fruits in these oases.It was a good weekend with 2 trips out to different parts of the area we live in. I have to say living in Al Ain is great as in 30 minutes we can be in a totally vacant area with no signs of human existence.
David Rumptz
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