Out Of Doha And Off To Oman

As my first school break was fast approaching, the question I asked myself was this: Where to go??? Doha is a great jumping point to a multitude of places and the only issue was picking where. I had a whole week to explore somewhere new, so the decision was hard. Turkey? Sri Lanka? Hogwarts? As the last was not an option, a friend and I chose to spend a week exploring the country of Oman. Read More...

I received a week off from school for the celebration of Eid al-Adha, which is an Islamic holiday that celebrates Abraham's willingness to sacrifice for God. For families that celebrate, it typically involves sacrificing a lamb and sharing within the family, friends, and those less fortunate. Terrey and I stayed in Doha for the weekend and jetted off to Oman on Sunday. We had a quick stop in Bahrain (literally it takes longer to dry my hair than it does to fly to Bahrain). We spent time idling around the duty free shops and enjoying some items you cannot enjoy at the Doha airport...

and after a nice view somewhere over the UAE, we finally arrived in Muscat.

The first day in Muscat, we decided to do a hop on hop off bus tour, which was our first mistake. I have found that customer service is quite different here and something to get used to. The bus company tells you that they pick up at the stops every hour, which already seems like quite a long time compared to other cities. We were not informed until we were already on the bus that that day, the buses would be picking up every two hours. Two hours? That is an extremely long time to look at a palace or look at a marina. But, we had already payed, so we continued on. There were places I would have liked to get off and look at, but could have happily stayed there for twenty minutes then moved on, not spent two hours. So, I opted to not get off and just view from the bus.

The only stop we did get off on was the Palace and various museums stop.

We were unable to visit any museums or go inside any buildings, as they were closed for the holidays. Later, when we told the bus attendant that it would have been nice to know these things before we payed, or even before we got off the bus for two hours, her response was "That's not my job" before moving us along. Charming...

After spending about an hour wandering the palace grounds (and getting quite sweaty if I may mention), we decided it was not worth waiting for the bus to come back to get us. We decided to hop in a taxi and make our way to the Mutrah Souq, which is Muscat's big marketplace. We grabbed some food and looked out over the Corniche.

Once the bus finally saw fit to roll up to the Souq, we hopped back on and rode it to the stop closest to our hotel. While Terrey shopped around, I chose to sit back and enjoy the view.

Terrey had a friend who knew a woman living in Muscat and had put us in touch with her. Sara was very kind and offered to take us to her favorite restaurant, On The Rocks, for dinner. I took my camera, but ultimately forgot all about it once I was eating all the delicious food. She knew the chef so we were treated to new menu items and it was AMAZING. Puff pastry covered olives, foie gras, pizza (of course), and a special coconut white chocolate with baileys dark chocolate dessert (to die for) washed down with a passion fruit cocktail and red wine left me forgetting anything but my stomach. 

We headed home to rest as the next morning, we would be getting our rental car in order to start the journey I was most excited for...