#  >  > Non Asia Travel Forums >  >  > Travel the World Travellers Tales Forum >  >  Saudi from sea to sand

## Larn

Ship wreck in the red sea


Clear skies


A long climb


Mud house


A long and winding road 


Lone palm


Welcome to....


 to the empty quarter


Trees


Balancing rock


An afternoon stroll


Hunting scene


One for the teachers... what language?


Training guide for butchers


A view through the gap


More desert


I can see for miles...


And miles


Ancient sea bed (found dinosaur fossil in the white riverbed.)


These are everywhere

----------


## DrB0b

Lovely pictures. I've wanted to see the Empty Quarter ever since I first read Thesiger's "Crossing the Sands" many years ago. Looking at it from Google Earth now though it seems to be full of oil wells  :Sad: 

The carvings look like a combination of Safaitic script and Bedu tribal markings.

----------


## Larn

It's beautiful and peaceful out there. On a full moon night you don't need a torch. The rock carvings were fantastic. 

It's the first time I've posted photos and was hoping the photos showed up bigger.

----------


## DrB0b

> It's beautiful and peaceful out there. On a full moon night you don't need a torch. The rock carvings were fantastic. 
> 
> It's the first time I've posted photos and was hoping the photos showed up bigger.



When you put a pic in the gallery here it's stored in three sizes, thumbnail, normal, and the real size. What you've got here is the "normal" size. When you insert a pic from the gallery remove the "normal_" part of the picture name from the link and it'll show the original picture, like this. 




Looking at in a bigger size it does look to me like Safaitic, though that's normally found in Northern Saudi. About 2nd to 3rd Century BC usually.

----------


## Larn

Thanks for your help Bob, i think i got it changed now.

The trip starts in the Red Sea off Qunfiddah through Ahba towards Najran and onto the highway leading to Riyadh. The rock art and empty quarter area is 400 kms south of Riyadh.

----------


## DrB0b

> Thanks for your help Bob, i think i got it changed now.
> 
> The trip starts in the Red Sea off Qunfiddah through Ahba towards Najran and onto the highway leading to Riyadh. The rock art and empty quarter area is 400 kms south of Riyadh.


Love the pictures, I think the less travelled areas of Saudi are some of the most beautiful in the world although I am, admittedly, a bit of a desert nut. It's not often you see personal pics from outside Saudi's main commercial areas. How did you get permission to travel through so much of Saudi, do you do something like geological surveys for an O&G company or have a particularly easy-going sponsor?

----------


## Larn

We don't need travel passes any more.  Sadly the empty quarter is off limits for overnight stays due to the possibility of kidnappings. The last time i went we were escorted back to civilisation by the desert police.

Camping and diving trips to the Red sea are still ok. I've worked in the region for many years.

----------


## Propagator

Beautiful pictures, something very differant.

----------


## Mr Pot

Fok no one can argue with this; 64 posts larn and contributed more than me!!!

really good photos and there have been some different photo thread beauties out there recently.

I lost my fokin camera in Malaysia and everday I see a potential snap that needs posting here, hopefully soon

----------


## sabang

Loved them pic's.  :Smile:  Have a green.

I'm a bit of a desert freak too, indeed of any of the worlds remaining vast empty spaces- theres a special feeling to all that space and emptiness. Really makes you feel small- perhaps more to the point, it puts you in your place.

Seen some lovely things in the Aussie outback, Nevada desert, Atacama desert and Andes altiplano. Siberia, Sahara & Yukon/Alaska would be nice to see too.

----------


## mobs00

Hmmmm..... Now where should I pitch my tent?

----------


## Larn

For the divers, the top pic is from a place we called Twin Ships. It’s about 50 km offshore halfway between Jeddah and the Yemen border. I was in 25 metres of water even that close to the ship. I moved out another 10 metres and my pinger went to 3 dashes. Deeper than 200 metres.   

  The sea is deep with pinnacles (old volcano cores) poking up to form mini islands. Viz is excellent. At 65 metres you look down another 50 until it goes dark. Roll on your back, look up and the surface looks as if can just reach out and touch it. Look out to sea and the water slowly turns a dark blue way off in the distance.

  About 70km off shore a wall runs parallel to the coastline. A long straight line of breakers mark the wall with little islands dotted over it.

  The water temp varies between 27 – 31c. Best of all its virgin diving territory.

----------


## Larn

The mountain pics were taken near Ahba and Souda, the highest spot in Saudi. 

  An 80 km drive along the side of a wadi from the red sea coast to the check point at the top of the mountain at Ahba takes you from sea level to 8,000 feet. The last 35 km of the drive up the escarpment is steep, rising from 3,000 to 8,000 feet. 

  This area gets plenty of heavy rain and flash flooding is common. There are 12 washed out bridges along the wadi. It just shows you the power of water with whole bridge spans washed hundreds of metres down the wadi and left looking like pieces of paper against the rock walls.

  Souda is a 30 or so kms away and 10,000 feet above sea level. It’s common for Souda to be covered in fog and the stunted pine trees are covered in “old man’s beard” moss.

----------


## Travelmate

nice sandy pictures

----------


## Larn

Here's a few more sandy pics :Smile: 


This is a mountain scene near Ahba


More mud houses. This was a village towards Najran




This mud house has flat slabs of rock embedded in it to delay erosion from the heavy rains experienced in the mountains


Local wildlife. Unfortunately the locals throw their rubbish everywhere


Lion head rock in the empty quarter. A natural formation that looked nothing like it up close.


I like this natural design


Now this is what i call a KingWilly :nerner:

----------


## TizMe

Nice photos. I'll add a few of mine from the Magic Kingdom.

In the film Lawrence of Arabia there is a scene of T. E. Lawrence and his Bedouin troops blasting a train. The train was running on the Hejaz Railway. Many of the trains that they sabotaged still lie where they were wrecked.

This one sits in the desert North of Medina.

----------


## TizMe

A little further north is Madein Saleh. Most people know of Petra in Jordan (even if only from watching Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade. Well Petra was built by the Nebateans, who also built Madein Saleh a couple of hundred years BC.

----------


## Larn

Great pics TizMe. They're places i wanted to see along with the crater but never made it above Jeddah. I saw some interesting photos the other day from a guy in the eastern province with whole dinosaurs still embedded in a sandstone outcrop. He said it was a few hours out of Dammam.

----------


## mr_hippo

I have many happy memories of my time in the Kingdom; I've just realised that it's 29 years since I first got off the plane at Dhahran - how time flies! Looking at the photos, the memories come flooding back - my ex destroyed most of mine.

On the Taif Riyadh Highway - coming down the third escarpment I reached over 100kph!

Relaxing in the desert after a hard days cycling! Taken between Riyadh and Taif when the Otabi tribe were still coming onto the highway with their raiding parties.

Larn, I hope on your travels in the Asir region, you managed to get to Al Habla - the hanging village. It was one of my favourite Thursday morning rides from Khamis air base; get there in the early morn, sit on the edge of the drop, watch the birds thermalling and then have breakfast at the restaurant.
The mention of Thesiger and the photo of the carvings bring back a wonderful memory for me - I worked at the RSAF base at Khamis, I spent one week in the flight surgeon's office and one week as medic on the weapons range. The range was so remote that we had to travel out there on a Saturday and stay there until missions were over on Wednesday. We had 2 range safety officers from BAe with us. After that days missions were over we were free to do whatever we wanted. Doug, from BAe, had recently come back from leave and had copied a chapter from one of Thesiger's books which mentioned the village of Amwar which was just north of our range. He persuaded his mate, Pete, to drive with him and find the landmarks that Thesiger mentioned - they found them all apart from the ancient writings and they searched for months! Guess who eventually found them? Me with the help of some spray paint! It took me a long time to design but it worked. I told Doug about it one Wednesday and he just had to go and photograph the place - he even went as far as having the photos enlarged to 8 x 10s. I told the Arab speakers at the range and also the local Prince and his Police Chief that if Mr Doug shows them the photos that the writings are old and very holy that that cannot translate them.
Months went by and I had just returned from leave and told Doug that I had translated the writings and Doug brought the photos to me. He was delighted but this only lasted moments when I told him to take them to a mirror, hold them upside down and look carefully - then he saw in a very broken script "Doug G******* is a stupid British pillock"!





.

----------


## Larn

Good one mr hippo…we may have crossed paths at some stage. I arrived in that area about 20 years ago. I know a few guys into bike riding and still bump into them every now and then. They were involved in some of the charity rides up the escarpment. 

One of the guys Aggy who sometimes worked out on the range was killed along with his wife in the 12go crash in Phuket earlier this year. He’d retired and won a free holiday to Thailand.

  The day after we arrived the company took us sightseeing around the area. Hanging village was one of the first places I saw. We parked in the lower car park. The valley was full of fog and just covering the edge. It wasn’t until we’d nearly stepped off that we realized how close we were.

  You won’t recognize it now. There’s little picnic buildings all along the edge and a cable car from the original restaurant down to the houses. When I first arrived abseiling was the only way our guys could visit the houses. I spent a many a weekend searching for desert diamonds near Al Habla.

  Souda has a cable car all the way to Ahba now. The Turkish fort hadn’t changed the last time I visited. I never made it out to the range but took regular drives to the one behind the tank base. The erosion made some interesting shapes out of those huge granite boulders.  As you drove back past the flour mill there’s a fenced off hill where the Queen of Sheba was reputed to have stopped on her journey north. 

  I’ll see if I can dig out some pics of hanging village, no guarantees as I’m in the same boat as you with the ex destroying a lot of them

----------


## mr_hippo

Those two photos of mine were taken on a ride that two of us went on from Dhahran to Jeddah - Trans-Arabia Ride
I have heard about the 'improvements' at Al Habla and wished they had left it alone. Just found a photo of the Al Habla area -

I'm on the right.

----------


## TizMe

Here's a different view looking up the escarpment near Taif.


The residents at the top of the escarpment.




Two camels in a Suzuki in Taif.


South east of Taif is Wadi Liyya, this photo is taken inside one of the old lookout houses. Through the window, on the other side of the Wadi is the next lookout house.





A bit further along the wadi is an ancient dam Sadd Samallagi. It has an inscription that reads, "Built by Abdullah Ibrahim by Allah's instructions, 59 Anno Hegira." (A.D. 680.) Over 13 centuries old, it was constructed without any cement. On the rare occassions that it has water in it, according to the locals, the wall doesn't leak.

----------


## terry57

Very interesting photos, well done.

----------


## racefan

The residents at the top of the escarpment.




What's with all that graffiti. Middle of nowhere and cnuts still have to do it!

One good thing about Thailand is that graffiti seems non existent.

----------


## Bruce

Fascinating photos. I want to go there!

----------


## farmerfloyd

That was beautiful,  It was somthing new to me, I love lush, green, tropical, areas.    But that was very good.   I grew up around  Nevada desert, pretty but wanted ocean  and palm trees.   thanks

----------


## RandomChances

Great post mate, I've only been in Kingdom a few months, I shall have to make the effort to get out and about a bit more. I'd post some pic's of Riyadh but it's just like a big building site  :Sad:

----------


## TizMe

Here's another day out. The camel races.
So its up the escarpment again.

----------


## TizMe

These races are held about 40 klm out of Taif. 
Here's the marshalling area.

----------


## TizMe

The race track is actually about 10 klm long.

----------


## TizMe

Its getting near to race time.

----------


## TizMe

This one made a bit of a false start and the jockey was having a lot of trouble controlling it.


With a bit of help they managed to get it under control.

----------


## TizMe

Ok, we're all ready to go.

----------


## TizMe

And they're off.

----------


## TizMe

Almost as entertaining are the spectators, once the race is started they all jump into/onto the pickups and chase the camels around the circuit with a spruiker yelling instructions to the jockey.

----------


## TizMe

It mostly goes quiet then if you haven't joined in the chase.
The cloud of dust slowly disappears into the horizon, and then reappears from a different angle and grows bigger as the winner is heading back to the start/finish line.



And the winner is:

----------

