| Gulf Air’s new summer destination is famous for its historic frankincense trade but it also boasts something even more valuable – rain. Julia Stuart experiences bothPHOTOGRAPHY PHIL WEYMOUTH
“Taste it,” urges Mohammed, our guide. “It’s good for the stomach.” I turn back to the unfortunate-looking tree and pull off one of the blobs that has oozed out of an incision made in its bark days earlier. The substance glows like amber. It is frankincense, once prized as highly as gold, and this, the Dhofar region of Oman, is said to produce the best-quality frankincense in the world. I put the sticky resin into my mouth and chew; it tastes like church.
Most tourists come to Salalah, Oman’s southernmost city, during the summer monsoon season, the khareef. Temperatures are much lower than in the rest of the Gulf, and showers turn the mountains emerald green, sending waterfalls roaring down them and, if it rains heavily enough, filling the wadis.
“Gulf people like to come when it’s raining,” says Mohammed, from Sumahram Falcon tours, when he picks us up from the Hilton Salalah Resort, which is set in a palm grove by the beach. As we head east by car, the heavens obligingly open and fat drops momentarily hit the window screen. It’s a leisurely drive, initially past coconut trees and then past camels that cross the road with the speed of old ladies. “In Oman it’s step by step,” says Mohammed. “We do things slowly, not like Dubai or Qatar.”
Our first stop is a clifftop with a view of the ancient town of Taqah, shrouded in a mist that looks like it has been imported from Scotland. Lines of white-rimmed waves rip across the sea like scratch marks, eventually collapsing on the beach. This is the town where, when it’s dry, sardines are dried in the sun as food for camels and goats. We wander round the castle, built in the 19th century as a private residence for Shaikh Ali Bin Timman Al-Maashani and later used as an administrative centre and residence. There are numerous rooms to explore, including an empty prison, a weapons store and the private suite of the wali (the local administrator), with its colourful canopied bed, intricate windows and numerous pictures of peacocks.
Along roads almost deserted save for the plodding camels, we reach Khor Rori overlooking the coast, with its ancient remains of Sumhuram, a strongly fortified centre for frankincense. Dating from the fourth century BC, it is the most important pre-Islamic settlement in the Dhofar region and is part of a string of “Land of Frankincense” sites that are on UNESCO’s World Heritage List. Ancient inscriptions can still be seen on the walls of the main gate.
An old marketplace has been preserved in the town of Mirbat, but more arresting are the traditional grand houses in dramatic states of collapse. One bears a picture of a dhow on its walls, a reminder that this was once a port used for the trade of frankincense; these days it is busy with fishermen.
Back on the road, past rocky expanses and scrubby low-lying vegetation, we eventually reach the isolated mausoleum of Bin Ali, where the man who is said to have introduced Islam to the Dhofar region lies beneath twin onion domes. Next to it is a cemetery, through which cows wander. Two stones denote a man’s grave, and three a woman’s.
Our eastern tour complete, we head west, stopping on the way to see Ayn Razat springs, full of darting brown fish and bordered by an oasis of lush vegetation. Families picnic in the nearby public garden. As we climb the brown mountains I wonder where all the famously lush landscapes have got to. Apparently we’re just too early: “It will all be green if you come back in a week,” Mohammed says. Suddenly we are engulfed by a Newfoundland-style fog that eventually clears to reveal families picnicking on the roadside, clearly enjoying the weather. We then walk through a walled garden past henna, lemon and fig trees and come to a large footprint on the ground, protected by a wall. It is said to be that of Job, whose 4m-long tomb lies in an adjacent building.
The temperature rises as we travel back down the mountain and join a road hugging the dramatic coastline, with clean beaches battered by waves high enough for surfing. We start to climb again, eventually stopping by the frankincense tree on the side of the road, a small part of which Mohammed encourages me to eat. “These are special trees,” he says, using a stone to cut the bark, which instantly bleeds milky-white resin. “It will be ready to harvest after 14 days. The trees are like people. When you cut them, they heal over again.”
Before returning to the hotel for the night, we visit the natural blowholes in the limestone at Mughsayl Bay. They roar like drag ons and squirt jets of seawater into the air, much to the delight of the waiting children, who return to their cars soaked.
The following morning in Salalah’s souq, between stalls selling canes, hats, knives, watches and scarves, we find the frankincense sellers. One of them, Alwi, brings out a basket of pale cream nuggets called hojari, considered the finest grade; they cost OMR25 (US$65) per kilo. He has sold out of an even finer green variety of hojari, which fetches OMR45 per kilo. He drops a piece into a bottle of water. “This quality is also for medicine, as well as for burning,” he says. “You drink it every morning on an empty stomach for about 20 days and it kills any bacteria,” Mohammed adds.
After a quick stop in the small but satisfying gold souq, where silver versions of the curved khanjar dagger, Oman’s national symbol, will set you back OMR500, we pass by papaya, banana and coconut trees on our way to the Museum of the Frankincense Land. It stands next to the Al-Baleed Archaeological Park, the medieval fortified settlement that is also one of the Land of Frankincense World Heritage Sites. As well as archaeological remains, which include Bronze Age incense burners, the museum has a small display devoted to the illustrious resin, including the claim that it activates the body’s immune system.
Ghanem Saeed Al-Shanfari, field coordinator for the Land of Frankincense sites, comes out from his office at the museum. “We have the best quality and the biggest production in the world,” he says. “There is no house in the area that doesn’t burn it early in the morning and the evening. My mother used to circle it round my head reading holy words in the belief that it would protect me throughout the day. I like to chew it. It relieves gas from the stomach and it’s good for your breath.”
Quite whether frankincense chases away evil spirits and is a cure for freckles, two other claims I have heard, is open to conjecture. I return to Bahrain as copiously freckled as I arrived, though hopefully decidedly more fragrant.
Sumahram Falcon runs a number of adventure tours in the Dhofar region. Visit www.sumahramfalcon.com or call +968 (0)9288 8591; Hilton Salalah Resort, +968 (0)2321 1234 |
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