Salalah Trip Day 4 : A Day In Muscat

I have found a really nice hotel in Muscat over looking the Arabia Sea. It was newly opened and they had special promotion.

I spend the morning visiting the local market and riding by bike all over Muscat. By mid afternoon I visited the Local Harley Davidson dealer. The staff was really nice they offed me a free bike checkup.

I went to bed early that night knowing that I have a 1000 KM ride the next day.

Salalah Trip Day 3 : Al-Ain - Nizwa - Muscat

Nizwa is the first over night stop in Oman. I was going to meet Mike an old biker friend that used to live in Kuwait. He had moved to Oman one year earlier.

It supposed to be as short ride to Nizwa 31 KM ride from the Hotel to the Oman- U.A.E border and 300 KM to Nizwa. I met Mike In a gas station 50 KM in side Oman. Mike came all the way from Muscat. the ride was a mazing and it nice to have a companion.

Mike toke me on a tour of Nizwa we visited an Old Nizwa Fort Built by Imam Sultan bin Saif al Yaarubi in 1668 AD and the Old Nizwa Market. 

There was a some sort of convention in Nizwa and the only hotel in Nizwa was fully booked.  I was left with two option. the first was to ride back to Al-Ain 331 KM. the second was to ride with Mike to Muscat 200 KM to spend the night.

I decided to ride with Mike to Muscat since I have never been there before and do some site seeing. 

GPS Data
Total Time: 8:50
Trip : 503 KM

Salalah Trip Day 2: Jebal Dhanna - Al-Ain

Knowing that I have 360 KM for my next over night stop. I started the day at 10:00 AM.  The roads from Jebal Dhanna to Al-Ain was amazing. Nice desert view with large golden sand dunes.  It was the meddle of the week and I had the road to my self most of the time.

I've spend the night at intercontinental hotels Al-Ain. The hotel staff was really friendly, they are used to see biker coming from all over the U.A.E. They offered me a secured barking for my bike and special discount rate.

GPS data:

Total time: 4:31

Trip : 369 km

Salalah Trip Day 1: Feb 29.2008 Kuwait - Jebal Dhanna (UAE)

We started as 7 bikers from Kuwait to Jbale Saudi Arabia . At 8:20Am we crossed the border to Saudi Arabia. The road condition didn’t change since my last trip.

At 11:30 AM we reached the Jbale exit. We stop and we said our good byes. From that point on I was on my own. I took it slow and enjoyed the ride. The roads where not so bad and where was little traffic.

The road from Al-Hofuf to UAE is full of challenges. Most of it is two ways road, the road is in bade condition, and probability of sand storm is really high at that time of the day.

After some hesitation I decided to push on. There was just a little sand storm and road was not so bad. I reached UAE border at 5:30 PM and in hotel at 7:00PM

That night the hotel was almost full and I did not have a reservation. The receptionist tried to take an advantage of the situation and he offered me a room for 2500 dirham it's almost three time the rate that my friend payed when he was there two months ago.  After some negotiation he agreed to give me the room for 1500 dirham.  Since I have no other option I agreed and payed for it.

It was nice clean hotel with an amazing service. I had my dinner and went to sleep.

The GPS have stop working after Hafuf I have to look in to it

For More Info go to Google Map

End of day one

GPS data:

Total time: 12:45

Moving time: 9:22

Stop time 3:23

Trip : 1,002 km

Salalah Trip: Itinerary

Going 
Kuwait - Jebel Dhanna (U.A.E)
Jebel Dhanna (U.A.E) - Al-Ain (U.A.E)
Al-Ain (U.A.E) - Muscat (OMAN)
Muscat(OMAN) - Salalah (OMAN)

Coming Back
Salalah (Oman)- Al-Ain(U.A.E)
Al-Ain(U.A.E) - Kuwait


Starting Date: Feb 29.2008
End Date:March 7.2008

Test Drive Dec 29. 2007

Since I’m going to ride more then 6,000KM in 13 days; it will be wise to make short test tripe. The objective for this trip was to test my endurance, test the bike, check on the road condition, and test the GPS

I traveled about 900 KM in one day. I started the trip at 7:00AM from Kuwait City and arrived at Harley Davidson  dealer in AL Khobar Saud Arabia  around 12:00 noon. The road condition has changed since my last trip to Qatar in 2006. There are more road detours but the road are well paved.

At 6:00 PM I checked out of the hotel and started my trip back to Kuwait. It was not wise to ride at night. The road was some what crowded with all the travelers going back to Kuwait. The road detours were was not paved well. In some parts of the road I couldn’t drive faster then 40KM/H

The GPS was really good. It has most of the roads on it and it was easy to read. The other option that I really liked is the ability to upload you route to google maps.

For More Info Go to Google Map page

Backrest

If I'm going to ride more then 6,000KM in 15 days. I need something to support my back . I hope this will do it .