Of Crossing Borders And The UAE's Great Wild East

Last Tuesday, it became clear that my hopes of spending the 4-day Eid break in Muscat or anywhere else in Oman weren't going to be realized. Some people didn't have enough travel documents, there were disagreements on where to stay, etc. I wasn't about to give up on a proper holiday though. So I suggested camping in Fujairah- an emirate on the east coast, with nice beaches and mountains, and as my research showed, nice wadis too. That the area where I suggested we camp at was adjacent to an Omani exclave was purely coincidence. Besides, that part of Fujairah reputedly had the best beaches.



Wednesday morning found me, a couple of friends from work, cousins, nieces and Ate Grace (cousin's cousin / shopping-mate / weekend buddy / etc) in the new company van we borrowed, on the way to the UAE's rugged East Coast. I was put in charge of navigation *evil laughs*. After selecting the sexiest man-voice on my phone's GPS, I punched in the coordinates to a wadi that supposedly had nice pools. I figured we could have a picnic under the shade in a cool wadi before hitting Oman...I mean, the beach. In Fujairah.

road trip!

Sean (my GPS man-voice) did a pretty good job directing us to the wadi, in spite of missing a detour. A few kilometers into the unpaved road though, I started feeling sorry for the new van and finally agreed to just turn back and head to the beach. The pools were probably way into the mountains, and the poor van wouldn't be able to handle the terrain. At least we saw some cute goats.

hello, little ones (photo by A. Tobias)

On to Dibba then, where the beaches are. Now, the thing about Dibba is, it's part-Musandam, part-Sharjah, part-Fujairah. It's a bit confusing. One second, you're in one emirate and you're in another one the next. And then you're in Oman *evil grins*. Well, you don't exactly get to cross to the other country in just one second. There is a border post. With nice border police. Who let you pass when you show them your national ID, give them a nice smile, and say that you just want to hang out at the nice beach on their side. See, another point for the Sultanate- they have friendly border police. And how cool is it that they're a Sultanate? It's like being in Aladdin. If you walk through one of the old villages, it's like walking through Agrabah. You could almost expect Genie and Abu to pop up somewhere. And I've digressed, sorry.

So, after driving through the little Omani village of Dibba Al Baya, with Emirati boys tailing us no less (apparently I charmed them too much), we settled on a picnic spot under a huge rock on the beach at the end of the tarmac. My cousin was hankering for some rice, but as it was the first day of Eid, all the shops were closed and there was nowhere to buy anything, unless we crossed the border again into the UAE. He did grill some really nice pork chops and chicken legs, so the rest of us were satisfied.

thank God for that rock (photo by A. Tobias)

The lack of rice and cousin's insistence on finding some actually forced us back into Fujairah. Fine. That was the plan anyway. We stopped at the nearby Lulu Hypermarket to get some, and bought some fish at the fish market before setting off to find our camping spot. We found it on Al Aqah beach, a few hundred meters from Le Meridien Hotel. It was quite busy- there were other campers, quad bikers, snorkelers, even a dog. The girls and I went for a swim before dinner, Ate Grace made a bonfire, cousin finally had his rice and was happy. Afterwards, we roasted some marshmallows for s'mores and settled into our tents for the night. I don't think any of us slept very well though. It was really hot, and quad bikers kept zooming around the beach even at way past midnight.

We woke up early enough to see the sun rising over the sea the following morning. It wasn't anything spectacular and for a minute there, we thought we were looking at the moon- until the ball of light got bigger and we all thought, "ohhh, okay, it is the sun." After a quick dip in the water, we packed up our stuff and I suggested heading towards Kalba in Sharjah, so we can take a different route going back to Dubai. Ate Grace and I got to try our new water kettle that you could plug into a car's lighter socket- and it worked pretty well! Took 10 minutes to boil 4 cups of water, but still. Hot coffee's always great after a night in a tent.

campsite at sunrise (photo by A. Tobias)

On the way to Kalba, we passed by what is believed to be the oldest mosque in the UAE- the Bidiyah Mosque. It's quite cute, different from the usual mosques you see. Made of clay, I reckon. Us girls were in our shorts though, so we decided against going in.

unconventional (photo by A. Tobias)

As we drove towards the mangrove park at the end of town, we saw some fishermen casting their nets out. Cousin got quite excited and insisted on going back to where they were later so we can ask for some free fresh fish (try saying that 10 times). We hung out at the park for a bit, disturbed some hermit crabs and oysters, considered going swimming again but were probably already too lazy.

Kalba Mangroves (photo by A. Tobias)

sorry, crab. (photo by A. Tobias)

We then headed back to where the fishermen were. Lingered for a while, taking photos of them heaving the net to shore, with their vintage rusty trucks. After they finished loading their catch, an Emirati guy who was surprisingly fluent in Tagalog (no accent and everything) came around to ask us if we wanted some of the fish (of course we did). He then took it upon himself to fill our plastic bag with as much fish as he can. While talking in his awesome Tagalog.

fish coming right up!

After all that fish business, we decided to finally head back to Dubai. I contemplated leading us to an Omani enclave near Kalba, but okay, enough already. I can cross borders another weekend.