Desert Campin

Well we went out to our spot int he desert that has a Gaff Grove. BUT to our utter dismay they have walled off the area!! Can you believe it !! Well we did find a place to go camping that had a few gaff trees and we made due now with the pictures

Picture of me petting a camel out in the open desert. You can see the wall in the background!!!

Our camp site.

Mom relaxing at the camp site. 

My lovely wife!!

 

 Now THAT"S a fire!!

 

 Andrew being cheeky!!!

 

 Dung beetle!!

 

 Camel Race day. I don't know if you cna see the robot jockey on his back.

Grandma at Madbah Wadi

Grandma at Madbah Wadi
GPS 24° 5'31.43"N 56° 7'12.99"E

Well when we stared out today Ashley said she did not want to go out today. I was feeling a tired as we had had a few drinks last night at the Rugby Club. Mom was kind of tipsy as well so we all had a good time. Well at about noon Ashley started asking when we were going to get going, so we were off.



The trip out to Wadi Mhadbah is pretty much a straight shot from the border in Burami. It is well sign posted so it was pretty hard to miss the turn off. All in all it is one of the easiest trips you can take. There are a few spots where the rocky terrain is a bit rough on the car but nothing too major.


We drove up the dirt track and took the turn off to the Oasis. There was an actual parking lot of sorts at the end of the trail; we had a nice herd of goats for a welcoming committee in the parking area. We disembarked from the cars and took a short hike up to some pools that behind a small dam. We had done our picnic here last time but we decided to set up by the big pool for lunch.

Swimming Hole
The pool is rather large with lots of space on either side. The pool  is split into 2 pools, the lower pool which is about 3-4 meters wide by 1 meter deep and the upper pool which is about 2 – 3 meters wide but and at least 2 meters deep. Also the second pool has a small waterfall that feeds it.





The 4 Meter Water Fall
On to the big waterfall, once up to plateau it is a short walk around the corner to the big water fall. The big water fall is at least 4 meters high and very impressive especially considering that we are in a desert! It is amazing that so much water is flowing constantly in these few spots as the rest of the area is barren rock field.

Foot Fries
After a few hours of playing in the water Andrew made an improvised fishing pool so he would catch some of the Dr Fish. He decided to use the French fires from lunch as his bait. He said he got plenty of bites but his hook was just too big to hook any of the fish. Tita hadn’t had much luck with the Dr. Fish and she say how they liked the French fries so she decided to try to entice the fish by putting French fries in between her toes!!

After playing in the pool for an hour or two mom and I went up the ridge to check on the second – much bigger- waterfall.  Mom did not have much luck with the Dr. Fish at the swimming hole so she gave it a try at the stream that makes the smaller waterfall. She had some luck with the Dr. Fish there.

Jazirah Oasis

Jazirah Oasis
Well we took mom to the Jazirah Oasis for a picnic.

We went to check out the site on Sunday as well just because I had not been there in a while. Yesterday we were joined by some friends from work and another friend from work came there to show his sister, who is visiting from the states.

We have been to the Jazirah Oasis several times and it is a great place to have a picnic, granted the pool is not very deep so it is not the best place for adults to swim.

We arrived at the pool next to the oasis at about 12 and had a picnic lunch. The kids then swam for a while in the pool created by the dam. While the kids were swimming I took mom on a tour of the oasis. We had a good walk through the oasis and even took the palm trunk bridge over the 30 foot deep gorge to the opposite side of the ridge. We got to do a bit more exploring of the ridge and went back to the picnic.

Mike (a colleague) and I went swimming in the wadi down the stream from the dam which was fun to explore but I decided I did not want to go much further down. As we were coming back up John (another colleague) and his sister drove up and mike and they decided to start at the bottom of the wadi and climb up the length of it.

A great thing about Jazirah Oasis is that the buildings are still made of mud brick and except for one rest house most of them are built using the traditional style of mud brick. Granted on one lives in the village any more but it is nice to see the old style.

I forgot to mention that mom did go on a hunt for Osama Bin Laden.

If you want to see more on the Jazirah Oasis go to my Blog http://travelingrumptzs.blogspot.com/2009/03/jazira-oasis.html

Wadi Aboul

Our original plans have been changed as I got invited to be the Dudgeon Master for a Game of D&D on Monday so that changed the at trip. Our fried who usually goes with us want to go to Jazira today and camping on Wednesday, so much for following our originally schedule.

We had spent the weekend in the house for the most part. Granted on Saturday Andrew had a birthday party at the Al Ain speedway!! Well it is really like supped up go carts. It turns out Andrew is a good driver at the young age of 13, he came in first for the group of boys who were racing.

While Andrew was racing , the rest of us went off to the new (ish) bawadi mall. We had had lunch already so we milled about the mall before we went to watch Alice in Wonderland. We all enjoyed the movie and had a good time. After the movie we went to buy a birthday present for the birthday party. Mom got sucked in for buying more Zhu Zhu Pet equipment for Ashley.

Wadi Aboul

Well as Grandma has not been up to the Wadi Aboul I decided to take her out to see the fort. The family had been here before and if you want to reed that adventure follow this link

Wadi Aboul

This time we drove most of the way into the wadi so we only had a short walk up to the fort. We did stop and show grandma some of the coll features of the wadi like the pools and the springs that bring p the mineral rich water. It is neat as you can see two pools right next to each other the ones that have the “fresh water”: and the pool that has the mineral rich water.

On to the fort, on the walk up we stopped to grad some fruit from the “Thorns of Christ” tree. The “Thorns of Christ” tree is said to be the tree they made Christ’s Crown of Thorns out of and it is believable as the branches are covered in long thorns and the tree is suited for the desert terrain of the Holy Land. The Fruit is very small and taste in a way like an apple with a bit of a bitter after taste.

On to the Aboul Fort, this place looks great and it is hard to believe that is has not been used or maintained for more than 50 years. The fort is in a great location on a small hill overlooking the formerly large oasis. It is a great place to explore as most of the fort is still in tack and you can get up to the top of one of the towers in the fort. A nice thing about the fort is that it has new occupants. There were several bats and geckos. This was a main selling point to the kids. And we were able to see several bats up close and personal. We got some shots of the bats but he picture I am posting I lifted off a newspaper article about bats in the UAE. One of the nice shots I have is of the interior of the mud brick wall where you can see that they stacked rocks in the wall to make it fortified. It makes sense as the people in the village would come here in times of raiding parties.

After the trip I decided to do some recon as I had not been to many of the site we are planning on going to this week and next. We ended scouting out all of the sites for this week just driving up to them and making sure we can find them.

Well today we are going to go off to the Jazirah Oasis GPS: N24 19 13.3 E56 09 06.7
This is an easy to get to site that has a great weir (dam) and pool that is caused by the dam. It is a great place to have a picnic and swim. The best part is that the oasis is a wonderful place to explore where you can see truly ancient homes and structures. You do nto need 4x4 to get to the site it is an esay drive with several stunning vistas.

Wadi Aboul

Well the first issue was getting the family out of the house for the trip they were pretty reluctant to go after spending all Friday in the house playing on the computers and watching movies on TV. But I prevailed even dragging Ttia out of the house.

Once we arrived I tried to take a shot and the battery on the camera was spent. Luckily I was able to take a shot at a time so I ended getting some high resolution pictures to supplement the camera phone shots I had taken.

The walk starts at a gentle slope going up the wadi, at several points you see small pools of water that are “iced” over. In fact they are covered with a film of calcium carbonate (like Tums ant-acids and bones) the water percolates through the lime stone dissolving the calcium and when then it deposits this over the course of the wadi. This is very interesting and in some of the larger pools the bottom of the pool is covered in white – including the plant material that has fallen in.

On the tip we did see some pools that looked good enough for a small group to splash about in. I am not saying it is swimming but it would be a nice spot to have a picnic and I am going to try to convince some of the guys to go out with me there.

On to the Aboul Fort, this place looks great and it is hard to believe that is has not been used or maintained for more than 50 years. The fort is in a great location on a small hill overlooking the formerly large oasis. It is a great place to explore as most of the fort is still in tack and you can get up to the top of one of the towers in the fort. A nice thing about the fort is that it has new occupants. There were several bats and geckos. This was a main selling point to the kids. And we were able to see several bats up close and personal. We got some shots of the bats but he picture I am posting I lifted off a newspaper article about bats in the UAE. One of the nice shots I have is of the interior of the mud brick wall where you can see that they stacked rocks in the wall to make it fortified. It makes sense as the people in the village would come here in times of raiding parties.

Not far from the fort is a village that still has some buildings being used for storage. The village is for me at least your standard mud brick and rock village. Granted some of the building did show signs of cement which according to Brien indicates that they were built or renovated after World War II. Brien indicated that swan lumber and Portland cement did not arrive in the region until after WWII. It was nice village with many houses in a fairly spread out area. The village still has a mosque that Brien says is still in use by the workers in the oasis across the wadi.

Grandma is HERE!!!

Well my mom finally landed.


You can put the GPS into either http://maps.google.com  or Google Earth to find the exact directions to the place.


Wadi  Aboul- Sudan car- Fort and Bats!!!
I was thinking of going to Wadi Aboul as you can drive a sedan there it is a paved road all the way to the parking lot. A bit of a walk but not far to get to the mud brick fort that has BATS in it.


Wadi Subaitah GPS: 24°15'53.86"N 56°9'40.21"E
You need 4x4 at the end of the trip but can make it most of the way in sedan we could ferry those without 4x4 up


Madbah Wadi GPS 24° 5'31.43"N 56° 7'12.99"E
A great place to go as it is a gentle hike up to the 2 waterfalls. It is not a difficult drive but you might need 4x4 for the last bit of it.


Gaff Grove Al Ain GPS: 24°23'39.60"N 55°39'8.24"E
A great place to have a BBQ or a Camp out, an easy place to get to (only 20 minutes from Al Ain city center) but you do need 4x4 and there are some parts of the drive that require a bit of skill. Most people have little difficulty except in a few spots- this is subject to change as they have been building a paved road out there. The last time I was out (New Years Eve camp out) construction on the road was in full swing.


Jazirah Oasis GPS: N24 19 13.3 E56 09 06.7
This is an easy to get to site that has a great weir (dam) and pool that is caused by the dam. It is a great place to have a picnic and swim. The best part is that the oasis is a wonderful place to explore where you can see truly ancient homes and structures. You do nto need 4x4 to get to the site it is an esay drive with several stunning vistas.


Wadi Subaitah GPS: 24°15'53.86"N 56°9'40.21"E
One of my favorite places to go as it is a bit more remote and smaller than most other oasis. It is a very interesting site that offers two ways to get to the swimming pools one way is on the falaja systems and this can be kind of  unnerving  for those who fear heights- though it is totally safe – my 9 year old daughter made it twice with no incident. The other way in is to walk the wadi to the swimming area.


Al Ain Desert
There is an easy to get to spot in a dune not far from the Golf Club. I have not been there but my wife has. It would be a great place to take the family out to have an afternoon picnic. I am currently getting direction and gps to the place…