November 18 is Oman’s National Day. November 20 is The Prophet’s birthday. The Sultanate of Oman declared November 20-22 a holiday and so it is high time for us to go on an adventure once again. We headed to Al Batinah Region’s Sohar Beach to go crabbing, fishing and camping. Here’s our story:
Every Journey Begins with a Single Step
Or rather, a little delay.
The plan is to leave our place by 8:00am. Expecting that they might be late, The Nomads went to the meeting place 15 minutes past eight and what a surprise, we were right. No one is there yet so we decided to go the petrol station for a topup and then we went back to the meeting place.
This time, … they are not there still. So we went on another round to our favorite coffee shop, Fun Shai. We bought ginger tea and Utoy’s favorite Omani bread with cheese and honey and again, we headed back to the meeting place.
This time, … yes, no one is there yet. Utoy started to make another plan of going to Fins Beach. He said if they won’t come, we better head to his favorite beach and go fishing there.
Luckily, at almost nine in the morning, they came. Our group said our prayers and we started to roll.
We made a stopover in Garda to do some last minute shopping and the others had their ginger tea from another Fun Shai branch there.
We then headed towards Muscat. Mam Elsie has to meet her and bring some stuff to her friend in Barka area. After meeting the friend, we went back on the road to Shinas.
The Way to the North
This is the first time for our group to travel this way because we have always headed down south of Muscat in our adventures. There are two roads that lead from Muscat to Shinas and we chose the old road for this leg of our trip. The way is a fresh sight for us. I can say that this side of Oman is more of an industrial zone as compared to the other side. There are malls along the way as well as factories. There are also farms that can be seen from the road.
We were amazed by the greeneries of Sohar. As we enter the city gate, the place seemed to transform into a tropical place as there are lots of flowering plants along the way.
Lunch at Sohar Gardens
After about two hours of driving, we decided to stop for lunch at Sohar Gardens. We found a place with a nice parking and we had our lunch under the shade of a tree. We had the Philippine’s national dish of adobo cooked by Chef Erick. We also had chicken macaroni salad from Mam Nancy.
After our lunch, we had our photoshoot by our Director of Photography, Sir Darwin.
Shinas Beach, Finally
Narz is our navigator from Ibra. He led our group up to the Port of Shinas. I have to take over from the port because The Nomads are the only ones who have been to the camping area. We have our story about our first trip here.
Luckily I can still remember it as if that trip was just only one month ago. After four years, almost nothing changed. The place is still as beautiful ever. We reached our destination at about 5:30 in the afternoon.
We set up camp, pitched our tents and settled down for a moment’s rest.
But the Fishermen Can’t Sit Still
The waves are calling and maybe it is a fisherman’s optimistic mind, Sir Balai, Narz and I headed to the shore with our fishing gears, hoping to snag a fish or two. We kept casting until the sun called it a day and the full moon started to shine.
After a few change of rigs, we almost gave up. Suddenly, Narz hooked got the first catch of the trip and that is good enough to raise our hopes.
For about half an hour more, we fished and fished until we finally called it a day.
Spoiled Adobo, Fresh Fish
Unfortunately, our adobo got spoiled. Fortunately, Narz caught a big one and with the macaroni salad and rice, our dinner is heaven. We even roasted some marshmallows.
We talked and laughed and laughed some more for some time. Later, our camp lights went off. Time to re-energize and get ready to conquer the beautiful beach of Shinas on our next day.
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