I traveled again, must be time for a Blogg post......

A gratuitous photo of one of my favourite Omani birds, the Indian Roller - VERY colourful - No? 

An Omani Patriarch

I just had a look at my blog and noticed that the last post was in early February, just after we came back from Paris and Brussels. Well I have just traveled again, so it must be time for another post. Hmmm so what's been happening?

In May we had a visit from our friends Maia and Stanford. While they were visiting we went up Jebel Akhdar (the Green Mountain, which I have posted about before. On Jebel Akhdar we went to the old abandoned village. While we were there I ran into three male generations of an Omani family. After exchanging greetings and taking photos of the young lads, who insisted on photos, the patriarch came up to me and insisted that I take his picture so that people could see what a real Omani looked like. So here he is a man who is proud of his heritage, nation and family:

The family inspecting Daylesford

Still inspecting Daylesford

Work is busy as we have just implemented. This meant that from January on I was effectively working 7 day weeks, with the occasional day off. Sigh, but then that's why I am here. In the end I could only get two weeks leave to return to Australia. This meant that I flew in on a Saturday, went straight to Canberra (home), where I spent six days, before we drove down to Ballarat and Daylesford (Mum and Dad) for two days, before hitting the road for Brisbane (the boys) and three and a half days. In all Katrina and I drove close to 2,500 km in a 5 day period. Katrina had it better than me as she went to Aus 4 weeks before I did and returned one week after.

Bush insects caught in the late afternoon sun

Mother and Child

It was good to catch up with people, particularly family and some unexpected people we hadn't seen since long before we left Australia for Oman. So all in all my two weeks away was a lot of fun, just wish there had been time to relax at some point. And in the whole two weeks I got to do one touristy thing, which was to visit Qld Zoo (No Not Bindiland!) with Katrina the boys and Georgie. I can highly recommend Qld Zoo, it may be small but the animal collection is interesting and the animals all seem so relaxed. Many of the native animals have relative freedom and the non-natives are in reasonable sized enclosures. The zoo itself is set in bushland immediately behind the Big Pineapple - which we somehow managed to successfully avoid.

Random Kangaroo

Anyway I returned to Oman for the last week of Ramadan, which translated into a 4 day week, because of the beginning of the Eid celebrations. The next week was even shorter at two days, because of Eid and Oman's Renaissance Day. Renaissance Day marks the anniversary of Sultan Qaboos coming to the throne of Oman. He replaced his father in an English backed, almost bloodless coup. His ascension to the throne sparked a modernization drive that took the country from a village based, agricultural country where donkey and camel were the only means of transport, to a modern developing/developed country. Quite the transition and the reason that Sultan Qaboos is revered across the country.

A mother and her sons

Well as Katrina returned mid-Eid we stayed at home in Muscat for the two days before I returned to work. Then yesterday morning (23 July - Renaissance Day) we looked at each other and said "well, will we go somewhere today?" to which of course the answer was "Why not"

I consulted friend Google and discovered that all on its lonesome was a fly speck on the map of Oman called Tool. Definitely within striking distance, Hmm I thought, intrigued by the name, can we find Tool and after finding Tool could we make our way through the Hajar mountains to the coast and back to Muscat? Only one way to find out..... By about 0830 we'd put some supplies in the Land Rover and hit the road.

After stopping at the mandatory petrol station in Bidbid we hit the road, heading inland behind the Hajar Mountains, in a Southerly direction. The built in GPS was not much use, as the map disc is from 2007, which in Omani road building terms is an eternity. Much of our trip was down Route 23 and we had to make our turn off onto route 25 - which according to the Land Rover does not exist! Yep too true once we turned off 23 we were on our own, except for the map that had pre-loaded in my phone.

Ripening dates

Throughout the day there was a lot of "which way do we go here?" followed by "I can't tell, the phone doesn't give me enough detail" then a decision and a couple of hundred metres later "Nope we went the wrong way" And this was before we'd even left the blacktop!

And leave the blacktop we did. As we were travelling solo there was no need to mind what anybody else wanted, so as opportunity presented we turned off onto secondary roads and wadi's. This made for a rather relaxed day at the wheel, but also a lot of extra distance offroad. So we stopped at various lookouts, ruins and the like. Sadly we never did find a swimming hole that wasn't already swarming with people.

Random ruins near Smut

We went where fancy took us, which meant that when we saw a sign for a Nature Park and a village called Smut - well we just had to go. And having gone, moved on.  Nothing to see, but we couldn't bypass an opportunity to visit Smut.

Eventually - probably almost two hours longer than planned we found Tool. It seems like a reasonable settlement, which is in the process of being completely bypassed by a dual lane road, running a long way into the Hajar mountains.

So having tooled around Tool we set off for the coast, by following the wadi on through. Every now and then we ran across roadworks - presumably that road bypassing Tool will go a long way into the Hajar mountains, possible even to the coast. As for memorable sights, well there was a bridge crossing the wadi, almost fully completed, mind you each end of the bridge was build right up to the rocky mountainside of the wadi. Yep if you could get onto the bridge, you could do endless circuits of the bridge, but that was all the road you would have to play on.

Watchtower near Tool

Eventually the wadi trail took us away and up into the Hajar mountains. Funnily enough along a road we had used to cross the Hajar mountains before. If you've seen the videos posted here ( https://db.tt/CIRbOGVJ ) then you've seen this road, which comes out at a place called Qalhat. This time around the road was much rougher, the last few months have not been kind to it, and in places it has deteriorated to what we Australians would call bulldust (loose dust with a consistency of talcum powder). In other patches rain has washed what little soil there is away exposing the underlying rocks. For quite a bit of the drive I had the suspension set to the highest ride height, something I hadn't had to do the previous time through. Anyway late in the afternoon we braved the switchback down into Qalhat.

Because of all the extra, mostly offroad, distance covered the car was very happy to receive the jerry can of fuel brought along for just such an occasion. Without that can we would have had to drive away from Muscat to the nearest petrol station.

So here we are, back safe in Oman.

Cheers.

Why?
Because they have the best mustaches!

Paris, Brussels and mixed emotions

Katrina's unexpected highlight, that's her at bottom left!

Well as highlighted in my last post it was time to come to Brussels again - more official meetings. This time Katrina told me in no uncertain terms that she was coming along for the ride, so I made the offer "How about we go via Paris". Well as neither of us had been to Paris this was met with rather rapid acceptance and some expressions of joy. Even though it is mid winter in Europe the prospect of Paris was, for some reason, just the ticket.

Add caption

When work finished on Thursday I went home, finished packing and at 1030 we flew out for Paris via Amsterdam.  Lo and behold around 8 we landed at Charles De Gaulle Airport, after a little mucking about we were on our way to Place de Liberte via Nord station. After losing each other in Nord we found our way to the right platform and the train duly arrived. So along with what seemed like half of Paris we boarded, amidst much jostling and shoving and set out on the last leg of our arrival in Paris. Just after we left Nord I discovered what all the pushing and shoving was about - my wallet had been lifted!  All my cards and some cash gone in an instant. GRUMBLE - welcome to Paris.

Gratuitous shot of  Notre Dame

We found the Gendarmes and began the lengthy process of reporting the theft. Which at this point amounted to no we can't take the report you have to go to the station at (wherever it was) and make your report. So we popped out onto the Place Liberte and were immediately confronted by the "je suis Charlie" memorials stacked on and around the statuary in the plaza. From there with the help of a local we found our way to the office of the Apartment rental company. They were lovely fed us coffee on arrival and passed me the office phone so I could call the bank and cancel my cards. While I was making that call my credit card was used - a test transaction methinks as the amount was 8 euro. Mind you the staff did tell us that guests arriving minus wallets, passports etc was almost a daily occurrence and that our losses were well to the low side. Luckily Katrina still has her cards and wallet. As an aside they recounted one guest who lost her passport turned up at the US embassy the following morning to request temporary travel documents, and found herself in a queue of about 40 people seeking the same service, for the same reason.

From there we went by taxi to our apartment (Museum View Apartments), which was across the road from the Natural History Museum, with views into the bone rooms of the Palaeontology building. The rest of the day was spent dealing with the police reporting, which resulted in a large wodge of papers for me to take home for use in helping get replacement cards. So that was day 1 in Paris - well except for the cycling up and down the Seine as we went about our business.

We got around Paris using the bicycle network. You pay a sum per day and get access to bikes from racks scattered across Paris. They abound around the main metro stations and tourist areas. All very convenient with cycle paths and lanes abounding. So you take a bike ride it and then leave it attached to the docking stations near your destination and provided individual "hires" are under half an hour you pay nothing above the daily fee. As an effective way of getting around Paris I can highly recommend this one, it has the added benefit of being much harder to have your pocket picked when cycling.

Yes it's a Dodo, at the natural history museum.

Bicycles have access to the transit lanes, so you generally only have to deal with taxis and buses, which show remarkable tolerance and patience for the poor bemused cycling tourist. I have to say that Paris abounds in alternate transport, cyclists, scooters (push and petrol powered) and roller bladers abound. The general motorised traffic moves fairly slowly because of the abundant traffic lights and narrowish streets. All of which makes for a much more pleasant cycling experience. Mind you Parisiens seem to have missed the EU notice that smoking is harmful to your health.

As close as we went to the tower.

So what did we see - Eiffel Tower - check, Cluny Museum (Lady and the unicorn tapestries) - check, Notre Dame - check, Military museum and Napolean's tomb - check, Museum of Natural History - Check and the Zoological gardens - check.

Being midwinter Paris came across as grey and brooding and given events of the previous week was on high alert, with heavily armed Police and Army deployed everywhere we went. They were usually in groups of three or more and looking rather serious. Everytime we entered a tourist venue it was off with the camera bag, so that security staff could look through it. This very quickly became part of a single process where I would present the bag for inspection and insert/remove winter woollies into the bag as necessary.

Just some of the detail in Notre Dame

We were blown away by the beauty of Notre Dame Cathedral and somewhat in awe of the ability to conduct a service with so many tourists swirling around. Many of them seemingly oblivious to the Mass being conducted and the worshippers. For a building verging on 1000 years (in parts) the grand old dame is holding up well, although the ravages of time are unmistakable. Katrina stayed at Notre Dame for a service and concert, which just happened to be given by a Sydney based choir. Very happy girl. Although she did forget the cap she'd knitted especially for Paris and left it on a pew.

Military order pouch, 100 years war, bearing the arms of
Marshall Bertrand Du Guesclin

Carving under the seat base of a choristers chair

Other highlights of Paris were the unicorn tapestries in the Cluny (next to the Sorbonne). They are truly spectacular and nothing quite prepares you for their size. They are BIG. Katrina was completely absorbed. I was quite taken by the old chorister seats lining the walls of a couple of rooms in the Cluny. Nice practical woodwork, but the underside of each seat displays a carving which would not be seen when the seat is lowered for use. The carvings are a mixture of trades, games and activities, a wonderful touch and I imagine if left to it the choristers would fight over who got which chair.

Some of the Armour that's not really on display

The Military museum was very good. Halls and galleries to be lost in. I spent most of my time in the Royal armour collection and the medieval/renaissance armour collection. I have never seen that much armour displayed in the one place and some of the pieces are simply stunning. By the time I got through them it was a quick walk through the WW1 and WW2 Galleries before visiting Napoleon's tomb. I ran out of time to see the relief maps and saw no sign of any Napoleonic gallery. Although that's not really an issue for me as the Brussels military museum has a more than adequate Napoleonic display, which I have been lucky enough to see more times than I can immediately recall.

Fashion?
Armour?

The sleeves and Pants?

The Military museum is housed in the veteran military hospital grounds.A small portion of the grounds are still used for their original purpose of housing veterans and attending to their welfare. A rather interesting juxtaposition I thought.

Napoleon's tomb - it's massive!

The zoo although small was nice, having been inaugurated in 1794. The animal houses are quite decorative. And it had my favourite big cat - the Snow Leopard, which were quite animated possibly because of the cold and the females hormones.

"Well come on and play"

 So rather tired and footsore we set sail for Brussels by the Thalys express train, which fortunately for us was delayed meaning that turning up five minutes after check-in closed was overlooked in the bigger issue of the two hour delay.

So Paris despite the pickpocket, the weather and so on - the jury is still out. It didn't do a lot for me, but maybe I'm just jaded. Lots of things to see and do, but then again there are so many other places that the completeness of my life does not require or demand Paris.

And so now we are in Brussels, and after a week of meetings catching the plane home for Muscat in the wee small hours of Saturday morning.

Belated posts and New Years

Well hello 2015 and farewell 2014. Can't say what happened to the second half of 2014, other than I must be a bit slack. There is a bit to tell.

In August, at the end of Ramadan Katrina and I jumped a flight to Salalah. It's the Southern end of Oman and the climate is just a bit different. In general Salalah is much more tropical, coconuts not dates, bananas, mangoes etc, etc and there are roadside fruit stalls everywhere. Fancy a fresh coconut? some pawpaw? Luverley bananas......

When we went it was the Khareef season. That's when a low lying mist rolls in off the sea and turns everything in the region a wonderful lush green.  It's also a welcome relief from the summer heat. Mind you everything gets constantly damp and while its not raining the roads are constantly wet, the wipers forever on and apart from the green everything is greyed out. Sigh.  But we found Salalah to be ok and there was enough to see and do for the four or five days we were there. Ancient ruins, rugged scenery and coastlines, and its where frankincense originates from.

Camels and the water near Salalah

The Khareef effect

Frankincense tree

Police barracks at Mirbat - where the last rebellion faltered.

Fresh fruit in Salalah

Katrina and the ruins

After that the balance of the year was fairly quiet the only other things of note were that I had another Brussels adventure, which I coupled with a trip to Manchester and a visit to Meaghan, Jamie and the girls and we had a weekend away in Bahrain - our second visit there.

Our living area

Other than that our other big news is that we moved house!. Our little villa in Al Hail has been swapped for a not quite so little villa in Al Hail! We moved in the weekend before Christmas and then ended up hosting a bunch of people for Christmas day. Much fun was had by all, let me just say that a bunch of 50+ ish adults and table top wooden santa bols do not mix - much danger but much fun. And don't believe it when you buy the wash - outable, draw on - able tablecloth. It is not a kids toy! We adults (maybe the definition adult is a bit questionable) had a great time with it!.

Guest living area

Having been in the house for almost a month now it is mostly set-up. We have 6 bedrooms which comprise of one master bedroom, one master guest room, one (yet to be furnished) secondary guest room all on separate floors plus a dressing room, a hobby room and a storage room. We also have a study, dining room and two sitting areas, plus a balcony and smallish backyard/garden. The good news about the balcony - and the rest of the front of the house are the ocean views. The panorama from the roof is spectacular.

Katrina and the VIEW

So now its mid January and I have another Brussels adventure next week. So we are going to leave on Thursday night and have three days in Paris before cutting across to Brussels for a week of work. 

Soo see ya - can't promise the next blogg will be any more frequent!

My My it's July - Well almost

Ripening dates

So the 29th of June it is. Hard to believe the two months that have just gone by.  One in Australia and another back in Oman, since my last post with Ramadan having started today. Our third one in Oman, how time flies.

Well the Australian trip was an absolute whirlwind. A week here, a week there with a lot of driving and a lot of people. Splitting our time between Brisbane, Canberra and Melbourne is going to be a fixture of our Australian sojourns now, as both Rufus and BJ live in Brisbane, our home is in Canberra and the rest of our families in and around Melbourne. Guess that's going to tie us to a lot of intra Australia commuting. Sigh. This time we hired a campervan, which was a good decision as while it was old and a bit clunky it got us safely from place to place with plenty of luggage space and on the occasion we needed it a bed for the night. AND it was cheaper than a rental car!   

Cheap and cheerful

We arrived home exactly a month ago, to an Oman where the temperature was on the rise. As we drove to the airport in Melbourne it was 14 degrees - when we left the airport in Muscat it was 45 degrees! And the temperatures have largely stayed up there since. Hot, hot, hot.

So what have we done this month? Not a lot to be honest. The first couple of weeks were spent getting back into the groove, letting the cats know we hadn't really deserted them and catching up at work. So no not a lot of out and about. Until these past two weekends that is.

Katrina storming Bid Bid Fort

Two weekends at home without going anywhere was a bit much. So on the third weekend we loaded up the 4wd and headed off for a place called Bid Bid. We were told it had a fort, the papers said it would be open and a blogg post or two said it was interesting - promising. Also only half an hour down the road. So after a quick Google Maps search the fort was located (not found said Google, but really rather obvious in the pictures!).  And then will wonders never cease the GPS said "yeah I know where that is..D'uh you don't?"

Omani Bucolic Idyll

Our drive to Bid Bid was rather uneventful. The fort was duly found and not unexpectedly closed! So we hung around the outside taking pictures of the fort and surrounding date farms and then simply drove off into the Wadi for some 4wd action before going home with a local pottery water barrel for the kitchen. It is date season here and the date palms were overburdened with fruit and really rather peaceful. The date grove was rather green and peaceful. Being towards the middle of the day it was also rather quiet, all in all very pleasant.

This weekend just gone we jumped a plane to Bahrain for the weekend, as an early birthday thing for Katrina. The original plan was to go to Dubai, but by the time I got to making the booking it was much cheaper to go to Bahrain and as we hadn't been there before it was a no brainer really.  Similar flight times.... SO Thursday night we hit the airport (Hint - Muscat airport has next to no long term parking now, luckily work is under 10 minutes walk away.) and but a matter of a few hours later we were in Bahrain, forking over a nominal sum for a visa and then off to our hotel, courtesy of their complimentary pick up. We can highly recommend the Palace Boutique Hotel in Bahrain, 20 rooms, pool, food, bar, restaurant....  But by the time we hit the hotel it was all getting a bit late so we took ourselves off to bed reasonably quickly, after a short study of the tourist maps.

Friday dawned, what else but bright, sunny and hot. Well it is officially summer after all. Breakfast was followed by more map study and the dawning realisation that we should have arranged a hire car. No problems the nice hotel people soon sorted that out and we had a Yaris for the weekend at a reasonable rate. Tally ho! And I swear I could hear the GPS calling from Muscat saying "D'uh Forgotten something?" Yes it has Bahrain maps which would have saved us a fair bit of mucking around.

Traditional Bahraini Garb

Trading Seals

As is pretty much our habit we started with the Bahrain museum. A nice, reasonable sized and very informative museum. Manama, the capital of Bahrain, has history dating back thousands of years. And the proof is there in the museum. It's a good first stop, because it tells the stories in a nice simple fashion, setting you up for the rest of Bahraini tourism, which doesn't have much in the way of informative information. Katrina was especially taken by the early (2000 odd BC) trading seals.  Interestingly the main floor of the museum has a map of Bahrain on it, which has lines running from points to various of the exhibits in the large entrance area. Really rather well done I thought.

From the museum we took off for Sheikh Khalifa's house. It's a rather large house laid out in traditional Bahraini style. A key feature of the house is the wind tower - an early form of aircon, absolutely essential in the climate. The wind tower has four air channels which allow breezes top blow into the room below, no matter the wind direction. Rather large wooden flaps can be opened or closed to allow or shut off the flow. It was stinking hot when we were there, but the gentlest of breezes coming through the wind tower made the room significantly cooler than anywhere else in the House.

Wind Tower outside

Wind Tower inside

But by then, after struggling with the back streets and the museum Katrina's knee said called time and we headed back to the Hotel and a couple of refreshing hours in the pool. Followed by a rather nice but rather expensive restaurant dinner and bed.

A thught for Sui

Some culture is universal......

Saturday dawned bright, sunny and hot. Our first outing for Saturday was the National Craft Industries center. Open 7 days from 0700!
Yippee, yeah, but no. We got there to find closed doors and the only people there were the glass workers, must be a dedicated lot. They told us that yes the website says 7 days, but they're never open Fridays and Saturdays, not even the craft shop. So we looked at the glasswork -

Bahrain Fort

which we greatly enjoyed and then took off for the Qalat al Bahrain - Bahrain Fort.

A massive pile of rock it is and that is mostly what it is. A UNESCO site under restoration and excavation since the sixties. The fort was impressive, but the museum on the beach below was even more so, especially as the temp was well above 40. The fort grew over a few millennia and was in use until the late 16c when it was abandoned and by the sixties very little was visible above the encroaching sand. That's not the case now, as we walked the 300 meters from car to fort the true scale slowly became apparent. Wandering through the ruins and the excavated and intact parts of the fort was fascinating. Unfortunately the only signage throughout the castle were for the art installations, or a simple number for the audio tour -  which you had to get from the museum on the beach below, but as we went straight to the fort..............

It used to b e a well

It was hot and getting hotter so we retreated to the museum below and inhaled water. Then we hit the museum. We had already seem similar things the previous day, but there was enough interesting differences to keep us happy and interested. More seals for Katrina, some tombs and diorama's. I was most impressed with the scale model of the smelting furnace. There was stuff and other stuff mixed in with other stuff..

The smelting furnace

From there we headed for some shopping, after all we hadn't bought any souvenirs yet. On our way to the fort Katrina had noticed a large mall at the side of the highway boasting Bahraini made arts and crafts. We wended our way through some back streets to the mall and went in to the small stalls. In the end we came out with a drink coaster that has an image of one of those seals that Katrina so admired and a painted rock that kinda looks like a camel - so it's in our camel collection now.

As we drove around Bahrain I had wondered about the police cars parked in reasonable permanently looking posts where the police always seemed to be looking away from the road as we went by. Well that's because they were. In the streets around the craft mall there was a lot of graffiti and we saw two makeshift barricades ready and waiting to be put back in place. As we drove out a little man on a motorbike drove up to one of the police points to deliver the pizza lunch!  And that was Bahrain. We will go back.

Oh got in the car this morning to be greeted with "D'uh did you miss me?" from the GPS"
Me "Shut up I know the way to work!"

And as of today it's Ramadan. The Holy month of Ramadan a month of celebration and fasting. So in the spirit of the times "Ramadan Kareem" to you all.

I do have to say to our friend Bob - get well soon, falling off motorbikes is not good for you. Stop doing it!!

<div> So the 29th of June it is. Hard to believe the two months that have just gone by.  One in Australia and another back in Oman since my last post, with Ramadan having started today. Our third one in Oman, how time flies.</div> <div> <br></div> <div> Well the Australian trip was an absolute whirlwind. A week here, a week there with a lot of driving and a lot of people. Splitting our time between Brisbane, Canberra and Melbourne is going to be a fixture of our Australian sojourns now, as both Rufus and BJ live in Brisbane, our home is in Canberra and the rest of our families in and around Melbourne. Guess that's going to tie us to a lot of intra Australia commuting. Sigh. This time we hired a campervan, which was a good decision as while it was old and a bit clunky it got us safely from place to place with plenty of luggage space and on the occasion we needed it a bed for the night. And it was cheaper than a rental car!   </div> <div> <br></div> <div> We arrived home exactly a month ago, to an Oman where the temperature was on the rise. As we drove to the airport in Melbourne it was 14 degrees - when we left the airport in Muscat it was 45 degrees! And the temperatures have largely stayed up there since. Hot, hot, hot.</div> <div> <br></div> <div> So what have we done this month? Not a lot to be honest. The first couple of weeks were spent getting back into the groove, letting the cats know we hadn't really deserted them and catching up at work. So no not a lot of out and about. Until these past two weekends that is. </div> <div> <br></div> <div> Two weekends at home without going anywhere was a bit much. So on the third weekend we loaded up the 4wd and headed off for a place called Bid Bid. We were told it had a fort and the papers said it would be open and a blog post or two said it was interesting - promising. Also only half an hour down the road. So after a quick Google Maps search the fort was located (not found said Google, but really rather obvious in the pictures!).  And then will wonders never cease the GPS said "yeah I know where that is..D'uh you don't?"</div> <div> <br></div> <div> Our drive to Bid Bid was rather uneventful. The fort was duly found and not unexpectedly closed! So we hung around the outside taking pictures of the fort and surrounding date farms and then simply drove off into the Wadi for some 4wd action before going home with a local pottery water barrel for the kitchen. It is the beginning of date season here and the date palms were overburdened with fruit and really rather peaceful. The date grove was rather green and peaceful. Being towards the middle of the day it was also rather quiet and peaceful, all in all very pleasant.</div> <div> <br></div> <div> This weekend just gone we jumped a plane to Bahrain for the weekend, as an early birthday thing for Katrina. The original plan was to go to Dubai, but by the time I got to making the booking it was much cheaper to go to Bahrain and as we hadn't been there before it was a no brainer really.  Similar flight times.... SO Thursday night we hit the airport (Hint - Muscat airport has next to no long term parking now, luckily work is under 10 minutes walk away.) and but a matter of a few hours later we were in Bahrain, forking over a nominal sum for a visa and then off to our hotel, courtesy of their complimentary pick up. We can highly recommend the Palace Boutique Hotel in Bahrain, 20 rooms, pool, food, bar, restaurant....  But by the time we hit the hotel it was all getting a bit late so we took ourselves off to bed reasonably quickly, after a short study of the tourist maps.</div> <div> <br></div> <div> Friday dawned, what else but bright, sunny and hot. Well it is officially summer after all. Breakfast was followed by more map study and the dawning realisation that we should have arranged a hire car. No problems the nice hotel people soon sorted that out and we had a Yaris for the weekend at a reasonable rate. Tally ho! And I swear I could hear the GPS calling from Muscat saying "D'uh Forgotten something?" Yes it has Bahrain maps which would have saved us a fair bit of mucking around.</div> <div> <br></div> <div> As is pretty much our habit we started with the Bahrain museum. A nice reasonable sized and very informative museum. Manama, the capital of Bahrain, has history dating back thousands of years. And the proof is there in the museum. It's a good first stop because it tells the stories in a nice simple fashion, setting you up for the rest of Bahraini tourism which doesn't have much in the way of informative information. Katrina was especially taken by the early (2000 odd BC) trading seals.  Interestingly the main floor of the museum has a map of Bahrain on it, which has lines running from points to various of the exhibits in the large entrance area. Really rather well done I thought. </div> <div> <br></div> <div> From the museum we took off for Sheikh Khalifa's house. It's a rather large house laid out in traditional Bahraini style. A key feature of the house is the wind tower - an early form of zircon, absolutely essential in the climate. The wind tower has four air channels which allow breezes top blow into the room below, no matter the wind direction. Rather large wooden flaps can be opened or closed to allow or shut off the flow. It was stinging hot when we were there, but the gentlest of breezes coming through the wind tower made the room significantly cooler than anywhere else in the   </div> <div> House. </div> <div> <br></div> <div> But by then, after struggling with the back streets and the museum Katrina's knee said called time and we headed back to the Hotel and a couple of refreshing hours in the pool. Followed by a rather nice but rather expensive restaurant dinner and bed. </div> <div> <br></div> <div> Saturday dawned bright, sunny and hot. Our first outing for Saturday was the National Craft Industries center. Open 7 days from 0700! Yippee, yeah, but no. We got there tho find closed doors and the only people there were the glass workers, must be a dedicated lot. They told us that yes the website says 7 days, but they're never open Fridays and Saturdays, not even the craft shop. So we looked at the glasswork - which we greatly enjoyed and then took off for the Qalat al Bahrain - Bahrain Fort. A massive pile of rock it is and that is mostly what it is. A UNESCO site under restoration and excavation since the sixties. The fort was impressive, but the museum on the beach below was even more so, especially as the temp was well above 40. The fort grew over a few millennia and was in use until the late 16c when it was abandoned and by the sixties very little was visible above the encroaching sand and soil. That's not the case now, as we walked the 300 meters from car to fort the true scale slowly became apparent. Wandering through the ruins and the excavated and intact parts of the fort was fascinating. Unfortunately the only signage throughout the castle were for the art installations, or a simple number for the audio tour -  which you had to get from the museum on the beach below, but as we went straight there...............</div> <div> <br></div> <div> It was hot and getting hotter so we retreated to the museum below and inhaled water. Then we hit the museum. We had already seem similar things the previous day, but there was enough interesting differences to keep us happy and interested. More seals for Katrina, some tombs and diorama's. I was most impressed with the scale model of the smelting furnace. There was stuff and other stuff mixed in with other stuff..</div> <div> <br></div> <div> From there we headed for some shopping, after all we hadn't bought any souvenirs yet. On our way to the fort Katrina had noticed a large mall at the side of the highway boasting Bahraini made arts and crafts. We winded our way through some back streets to the mall and went in to the small stalls. In the end we came out with a drink coaster that has an image of one of those seals that Katrina so admired and a painted rock that kinda looks like a camel - so it's in our camel collection now. </div> <div> <br></div> <div> As we drove around Bahrain I had wondered about the police cars parked in reasonable permanently looking posts where the police always seemed to be looking away from the road as we went by. Well that's because they were. In the streets around the craft mall there was a lot of graffiti and we saw two makeshift barricades ready and waiting to be put back in place. As we drove out a little man on a motorbike drove up to one of the police points to deliver the pizza lunch!  And that was Bahrain. We will go back.</div> <div> <br></div> <div> And as of today it's Ramadan. The Holy month of Ramadan a month of celebration and fasting. So in the spirit of the times "Ramadan Kareem" to you all. </div> <div> <br></div> <div> I do have to say to our friend Bob - get well soon, falling off motorbikes is not good for you. Stop doing it!!<img width="1315" src="http://i.imgur.com/vwSrwx7.jpg"></div> </div> </div>

On the Commonwealth

Over the last week or so I have been reading about the Australian Government Commission of Audit and the upcoming budget, which by all accounts is reckoned to be a horror story in the making for the common man.

What I have read about the commission of audit recommendations fills me with dismay, it is a narrowly focused set of findings based on the principle that Government has no place in service provision and market forces are best. In my view this is wrong on so many levels that I don't really know where to start.

Now correct me if I am wrong in any of this. A government is elected to serve the country and the people of the country. Not just one sector but all the countries peoples.

Governments - be they state or Federal exist to govern and provide essential services that pull a community together and give a common direction. Or at least a direction that the majority can agree to.

Australia is a Commonwealth, a federation of the states and territories. They banded together to build a stronger Australia as a Nation. The concept of a federation and a commonwealth is one of common purpose and mutual assistance. States and Territories are not competitive market driven entities, and should not be forced into such a role.

Have a think about the word Commonwealth. Yes sure it means an aggregation of entities into something larger. But the origins of the word are "the common good". That's right the common good, in other words to safeguard and improve the lot of everyone, the common wealth.

I am no economist, but I can see that pushing current federally provided services out to states to run competitively  (on a business footing) does not make sense. Doing this will create winners and losers across the country for no other reason than where you live. Larger or more populous states will have the economies of scale to provide good services. Tasmania, Northern Territory, ACT and probably South Australia will be disadvantaged. And it's not as if you can walk around the corner to another "shop". You would have to move state. Sure people do that all the time, but not everyone can or wants to and for every "economic refugee" this creates the worse the lot of those remaining will be. Less people, less money, less services and thus a downward spiral.

I guess the thing that gets my goat is just how narrowly focused this commission of audit is and how one sided the proposed solutions are. An audit by a self interest group for a self interest group.

What we are seeing in Australia (and other countries) is the effect of an entrenched political class. People who view politics as a profession and an end in its own. The loyalty is to the party, not the people and the country as a whole. What matters are the deals and interest groups that provide the patronage. If you don't belong to the party or support the party then your interests don't really matter.

I don't doubt that many people enter politics out of a sense of public duty, but somewhere along the way the majority give the impression of having lost that focus.

Of course the two party preferential system doesn't really help things either. Successive legislation has entrenched the existing parties, making it difficult for other parties to gain traction. And of course when a threat to the existing order comes along the two parties close ranks to negate the "common enemy".

To jump around a bit. Over the past twenty plus years I have watched as a succession of economically driven policies have divested Australian Governments of a range of Government business enterprises and sold off public assets. I am sure there is sound economic theory behind this. But by doing so the Government's ability to affect the market place without legislation was lost, and the revenue base narrowed to simply taxation.

The same and similar economic theories have also narrowed Australia's range of economic activity. The loss of the car industry being a great example of that. Throwing up another set of disused factories in Australia's industrial wasteland. Victims of a sort of scorched earth approach.

I have to say that a community is not a corporation. Business is a part of it. But a community is and should be about people, their wants and needs and ensuring that we use and distribute our wealth equitably. By any objective measure that is not happening now.

Yes our captains of industry are doing well - for themselves. Just watch the business councils antics whenever general wage rises are proposed. Then watch their antics as they propose executive remuneration increases, that are completely out of kilter with the rest of society.

And what of the people in our society who are suited to manufacturing positions? Oh too bad they got left behind because they couldn't re-skill or weren't suited to another role. Australia used to have a well rounded economy, now? By my reckoning our economy is becoming increasingly hollow as manufacturing shuts down and service jobs are off-shored to wherever is cheapest.

Where to Australia? Is Australia may be a commonwealth, but where is the sense of Common Wealth?

Yippee it's holidays

Yay

In two days time Katrina and I will be flying out for home and just under a month back in Australia. Really really looking forward to time in Australia. We will spend the first week in Brisbane staying with no1 son (Rufus) - mind you I will spend much of that time at a conference, where I will be a tech talk facilitator and a workshop instructor. So my time with Rufus and Brisbane people will be a bit limited.

After that we head off to Canberra where we plan to arrive on the 11th. That will let us catch up with the Beej, our house and various friends. After that we head off to Victoria doing the round trip through Wonthaggi, Melbourne and Daylesford to finally fly out of Melbourne on the 28th. It will be a whirlwind three weeks but fun nonetheless.

So looking forward to Australia.

Just how unreliable can one 4wd be?

Since March we have been rather busy and so quiet in Oman. The 4wd has been off the road as much as on. A succession of sensors and diodes have died, usually at inopportune times. Last weekend we set off for a last quick spin up a wadi before leave. Within 2kms of the exit the crankshaft sensor died - so no spark, no go. Luckily I was able to coax the car to a tree where we sat out around four hours while our rescue was arranged - thanks to Herman and Jane and Robbie and Lucy.  Mind you a two hour outing became a full day and so now we are behind on our packing and so on.......

But as ever those views!!!

Summer is fast approaching and as a precaution I had most of the rooftop plants moved down and under the shade trees. Pretty soon the roof will become too hot to be relaxing. Unfortunate that.  But we have been lucky this winter with the temperatures staying down longer and more rain than usual. Far more rain than usual.......

The guys tell me that the last few years in Oman have been brilliant, with much more rain than they have seen  before. And boy is rain celebrated here, unfortunately sometimes with tragic consequences. You see drains have not been a part of urban planning and when it rains people come out to watch the wadi's in full spate and people get caught crossing in their cars or playing too far out into the water.

So while an upside is more rain, the downside is the deaths.

About to get it on

And the winner is - the Brown bull.

On a cultural front the only thing of not we did was going to the traditional bull fights. Interesting it was. Clearly a community based activity with a concrete bull ring and a hundred plus bulls in attendance. Apparently on the day of the fights owners bring the bulls in and tether them around the ring. Then they go into the middle and arrange the matches between each other.

I'm a comin to get Ya! - but when he got there he declined the bout!

So many bulls in one place - what a racket. The young ones are up and calling their challenges, while here and there an older bull sits and watches, as if knowing that saving their energy for the coming contest is the sensible idea - yawn.

So what is Omani  bull fighting. Well the bulls are pretty much matched for size. When their turn comes they are led into the ring and face up to their opponent. They are brought together and locking horns the contest begins. The two bulls push and shove each other around until either one is driven backwards and beaten, or time is up and an end to the contest is called, at which point their handlers pull a rope attached to their front leg forcing the bulls to separate.

Run and hide, run, run

And on occasion a bull breaks loose, or two bulls agree they've had enough and take off, scattering the spectators, as the handlers/owners desperately rush after them trying to bring them back under control. At one point two bulls took off together and made it all the way out into the car park. As soon as it was safe all spectators were back in the ring sitting down and waiting for the next match. But shush, please don't tell the occ' health and safety guys!

All in all the bulls seemed to enjoy their bouts and we saw no sign of any injuries. So while it was fun, interesting and a cultural thing, not sure that we will go again.

Cheers, bags mostly packed, an early night tonight and tomorrow night then off to the airport and Aus............

See ya