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Old 13 Feb 18, 12:20 AM  
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BONZO
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Well, Wadi ya know - Lausanne to Muscat 2018 Day 3 (Arrival in Oman)

Thursday 18th January

Cast:
Me: Shaun
Alison (who edits and adds comments to these reports before I post them!)

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We touched down early in the morning - at about 07:15 local time but I think we were still a bit sleepy and could really have done with a couple more hours sleep to be honest.




It was a very long taxi off the runway until we finally parked up on a remote stand. Out of the window we could see the cleaners being frisked and ID checked before they were allowed to go anywhere near the plane. Reassuring and worrying all at the same time!

Initially we queued up for entry visas, not cheap at 20 Omani Rials (OMR), about £40 each. We paid in local currency but the desk clerk asked for £20 notes instead. After a short while and with growing queue behind us he relented and handed over the visas, not sure if he was pulling a fast one or not to be honest but you could see how some jet lagged tourists might be conned.

Passport control was extremely thorough but luckily we were allowed to approach the desk together so Alison answered all the questions (I can never remember exactly which day we are going home, or the name of the hotel we are staying in!). And so we made our way outside into the heat and collected a taxi from the rank and confirmed what the price would be – 10 OMR (about £20). (We’d looked up the information before we left so that we literally wouldn’t be taken for a ride – we may have paid a couple of £ over the odds, but it was about right).

I do like the trips from the airport to the hotel to get a flavour of the country although it’s normally through heavy industrial areas that tend to be built nearby the airports. The motorways were almost identical to those found in Florida apart from the distinct lack of traffic on them.

The local shops we sped past had a familiar ring about them, Starbucks, Subway, McDonalds etc., Globalisation at its gaudy best.

We pulled up outside the hotel – the Grand Hyatt - and were immediately impressed as an Omani man (who looked like and was the same size of Bernard Bresslaw) welcomed us into the largest hotel lobby I’ve ever seen. It was simply cavernous, huge with a large statue and overly ornate stained glass atrium and polished granite floors.

Simply breath-taking and I had trouble taking it all in to be honest, almost a religious feel to the place. The pictures don't do it justice, but we were a bit self conscious about taking photos not wanting to cause office.



We knew that being so early (it was about 9am by now) our room probably wouldn’t be ready and thought we’d just be able to drop our bags off and go for a wander. Instead of this they said if we’d like to wait a while the room might be ready if we cared to take a seat in the club level lounge which we did. (I ought to say here that we’d booked to stay on the club level because we’d read how expensive Omani food and drink was and from experience we knew we could almost live on lounge goodies!)

We enjoyed a light breakfast of fruit, cereal and pastries together with coffees, in the plush lounge.



We then relaxed in some comfortable chairs but started to nod off a bit!

After only half an hour, one of the lounge staff said there was a phone call for us which turned out to the front desk. They said they had a room for us but it was 2 doubles rather than one king. We said that would be fine (we were just really grateful to get into a room so early! I think if we’d had to wait much longer we’d have gone down to the pool and snoozed on sun loungers!)

The front desk clerk came to collect us to show us to our room (440 for the record)but would you believe it – the keys wouldn’t work – back to the lounge! He came back a few minutes later with new key cards, off we trot and they still didn’t work! It turned out to be the batteries that had gone! Only a 10 minute wait, all fixed and we could get into the room.

Again, a very impressive bedroom, with a lovely view and I took a couple of pre-mess snaps for the album.







We unpacked (which didn’t take long because we didn’t have much), had a shower and then just crashed out for a couple of hours (setting an alarm before laying down!)

We wandered up to the lounge to get a cup of tea and some cookies








and went for our first wander to get a feel for the local area near the hotel. The pool area looked typically American in style and theming, I wonder if the Hyatt has a corporate body that just ships stuff out to each of its hotels? Really this wouldn’t be out of place in America to be honest. The pool and surrounding ground areas were immaculate and lots of staff cleaning etc. all around.

We wandered down to the beach and took a couple of pictures, mindful not to take photographs of the surrounding buildings as the hotel is in the embassy quarter and apparently they can get a bit twitchy if they think you are taking some clandestine snaps of the security arrangements.

The beach was a huge expanse of sand, stretching out to the horizon towards both the left and right. Apart from us there weren’t that many people around, not even any boats and certainly no sign of any jet skis etc.





Although we are not big shoppers we thought we’d take a stroll to the nearest mall and see what the local shops had on offer on the way and check out any local places to eat. We walked for a while past some foreign embassies and some lovely properties and came across a huge motorway flyover with about 5 lanes of traffic no visible safe way of getting across. Like some parts of Florida it seems like pedestrians aren’t really being catered for here. Defeated, we began to walk back to the hotel with the sounds of an occasional taxi hooting us, probably as we looked like typical tourists.

Eventually we decided to take up one of them on their offer and asked to go to the nearest shopping mall. The driver didn’t really understand or speak any English so Alison showed him google maps that had the location down in Arabic but we were still not convinced he understood. We drove on and he did say something about a baby market! Despite not being in the market for such things we agreed that was the location and he dropped us off, right outside a Starbucks! It turned out that the baby market was in fact Mothercare!

We took a look around the few shops inside and eventually found some cheap socks for Alison and a couple of new T-Shirts for yours truly. Surprise, surprise, we ended up in Starbucks before getting a taxi from outside back to the hotel.

As we approached the hotel entrance we were greeted by something that you don’t see every day, two armed military personnel (with Kalashnikov rifles!) and an airport style scanner that we had to go through. Well, that wasn’t there before, and we didn’t really know what the purpose was until much later. All will be revealed….

We went back up to the room to drop off our bits and pieces and got changed for some relaxing time down at the pool. We just stretched out in the sun and relaxed, then swam in the pool, had a dip in the hot tub and floated round lazy river. It was lovely and warm at around 27 degrees (which seems even nicer when it’s only about 3 degrees back at home!)

Eventually we decided it was time to go back to the room to shower and get changed for evening snacks in the lounge.

On arrival, they took one look at me and politely told me it was long trousers for gentleman in the evening here (I was wearing long tailored shorts), thank goodness I at least had some clean smart jeans with me which I put on after doing the walk of shame back to the room.

It was advertised as hors d’oevres so we were expecting a few bits and pieces, but the spread was fantastic! A selection of salads, meats and cheeses, a choice of breads and a few hot items. Then there were some desserts and a full cheese board! A full bar was on offer as well – and all this was free between 6 and 8.30pm.



Yum, it was Indian food tonight (the theme changes each evening), so we filled our plates and sat on the patio in the evening warmth. Our lovely lounge staff kept us topped up with Prosecco, red wine and gin and tonics until we couldn’t manage any more.

We decided to have a last wander along the beach then took some photos of the hotel







before we headed back to the room at about 9pm absolutely shattered.
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Edited at 02:40 PM.
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Old 7 Jun 18, 04:25 PM  
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Gosh, I’m intrigued by this place but unsure all at the same time! Looking forward to reading the rest.
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