Following our canyoning trips in Wadi Bani Awf and Wadi Bani Kharus, we decided, with Pierre and Solal, to visit Wadi Shab Wadi Taab, Wadi Al Hail in eastern Hajar and Bandar al Khiran. We also included in the itinerary the dearest to my heart of all spots in Oman, Al Tahri cave. Its exploration sparked my love story with the wadis, caves, and mountains of Oman.
Our journey started early morning on April 23 from Muscat heading south towards Sur on the coastal road.
The first stop was in Al Swayh, a beautiful village nestled at the junction of two major canyons, Wadi Al Hail and Wadi Al Naqma, forming Wadi al Arbeyeen.
The trail starts in the beautiful gardens of Al Swayh after which we advance in the wadi bed towards one of the most spectacular rocks ever.
It is almost a perfect cube with 20m long sides. To reach the spot, we had to walk and swim for around two hours. The first time I spotted this massive cube was in 2006 and the first time I climbed on the top of this massive ‘monster’ was back in January 2008.
I took Solal on the top of the cube and we abseiled down into a superb pool with crystal clear water while Pierre climbed on the mountain to take pictures of the two of us on the top of the rock.
We had a snack at the bottom of the ‘cube’ and started the trip back to our car. The journey was ‘very wet’ as we decided to dive into every pool we encountered.
We reached our vehicle late in the afternoon and drove to Tiwi where we had booked two rooms in a guesthouse for the next four days.
Our next trip was an easy one: Wadi Shaab. I visited this place tens of times and I keep enjoying it every time I go back. The wadi was full of water because of the heavy rains it received 5 days earlier. It took us around 45 minutes to reach ‘the cherry on the cake’, the famous keyhole at the entrance of the cave with the popular waterfall inside.
Solal was stunned by the beauty of the place and could not hold himself from climbing and jumping into the pool inside the cave.
It was quite a relaxing day as we went back home early in the afternoon and chilled in the small swimming pool we had on the terrace of the house.
The next day we jumped in the car after breakfast and took the road to the Selma plateau where the famous Majlis al Jinn is situated.
Halfway up the mountain we parked our car and started a two-hour trek to reach the majestic entrance of Al Tahri cave.
We stopped for a short dehydration break before penetrating inside this fantastic dome.
The ceiling of the cave is around 50m high and one can still see the light coming in from the entrance even after walking more than one kilometre inside amid flowing water.
After a walk of around 40 minutes, we had to climb a 20-metre cliff and progress another kilometre to reach a bifurcation.
This place is so dear to me because I was with my masters in outdoor activities Patrick and Nathalie Cabiro and with my ‘brother’ Jean-Louis Géraud aka ‘mon frère’ for my first-ever real adventure trip.
It was during that trip in 2001 that I discovered an extraordinary chamber with Jean-Louis while Patrick and Nathalie were waiting for us at this same bifurcation.
We decided to name it ‘La chambre des deux frères’ (The two brothers’ room).
We kept this discovery secret to avoid people entering and causing damage to the very fragile and exceptional speleothems inside.
But many years later, I heard that some other people entered it and decided to call it the ‘Crystal Chamber.’
Our journey ended at the bifurcation and we trekked back to our car and reached our accommodation in Tiwi at sunset.
Wadi Taab was the last canyon we visited.
We started at ‘Al Marfas’, the village of my dear friends Yusuf and Ahmed. They are among my oldest and dearest Omani friends that I met during my first trip to Al Tahri cave in 2001.
From Al Marfas we abseiled many big drops in a tributary to reach Wadi Taab and then we started going upstream until we reached a high waterfall that we couldn’t climb.
The canyon was full of water, the waterfalls were flowing abundantly and the pools were superb with transparent green waters.
We decided to turn back and reached a magnificent cave next to a beautiful pond where we stopped for our snack.
We returned to the car tired and enchanted by the way Mother Nature treated us for the last few days! This was our last canyoning trip before going back home.
For Pierre and Solal’s last day in ‘Amazing Oman’ we decided to spend time on a ‘private’ beach in Bandar Khayran.
I called Mohamed a good friend of mine from Khayran that I met when he was barely 10 years old in 2000 and when I was accompanying a French TV crew shooting a documentary about traditional fishing in his village.
He took us in his fishing boat and dropped us on a beach where we used to camp with my family.
The water was very clear and we managed to see plenty of beautiful marine creatures while snorkeling.
Solal and Pierre could hardly keep themselves from jumping from the cliffs into the sea.
The following day the two French visitors left Oman, promising that they would come back for more adventures.
A few days after returning to France, Pierre sent me these few words:
“It is always a great pleasure to go back to Oman. Everything is big, surprising, and contrasting.”
“The roughness and sharpness of the rocks do not account for the deep work of the water in shaping up their forms.
Canyons with unfathomable depths are surprising because of their size and different altitudes. The ocher-coloured sedimentary rocks constantly play with the light even in the depths of the caves.
We were lucky to arrive after exceptional rainfall. They remind us of the humility that we must keep in mind during our explorations, as they have carried astronomical quantities of rocks. And there again, ambivalence plays a role, seducing us with crystal clear water which has been able to wash away the stigma of its vehemence.”
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