ABHA
And First Time Couchsurfing
26th October - 28th October | 2023
The next morning I finally went to Rijal Alma, the famous heritage village. I was a bit hesitant as the weather forecast was not too good after 12h00, but I took the risk. On the way down into the valley you pass over nearly 2900m of Al Soudah. As the weather was still good I was really lucky with the view down into the valley and surrounding mountains. At the parking lot, a young couple approached me, but I couldn't take a picture of us as they were officially not together - so it does exist here as well ;-)
What a switchback road down! Very narrow and very tight steep curves - greetings to my brake pads!
Rijal Alma was beautiful, but in my opinion, it is not worse to pay the entrance fee to go inside - after seeing along the road already other heritage villages. Please note, that this is my opinion! I met people who loved it! I ended up chatting with one of the local shop vendors about tourism when I noticed that the sky got darker and uglier. I better make a move back into the mountains, back to Abha!
I didn't get far when it started to rain! Up these switchbacks was now no fun at all, as not only raining, it was now also foggy with very bad visibility! And being Thursday afternoon the locals love to get out into the rain in their jeeps! But why switch on the lights on your car, when your car blends in fantastic into the fog? It was full concentration as the drivers downhill were also in a hurry overtaking slow drivers! In one steep switchback the car before me decided to turn around, so I had to stop just before the switchback! With the steep inclination and directly into the curve it was not easy for me to get going on the wet asphalt - took me some attempts until I was around without interfering with the upcoming traffic! You cannot believe how happy I was once I reached the crossroads at the top!!
It was still some kilometres to drive back to Abha, and the temperatures went down to about 10ºC - what a difference to the last weeks!! Last night I had to dig out my warm layers from the bottom of my luggage! Back at the house, I just got myself sorted when Shaker came home and took me for a ride in his car. It took him a while until he understood that I just got back from Rijal Alma! However, he drove down these switchbacks with me. Even in the car, still raining and now in the dark, it was really scary with all the traffic. And as he knows that road very well, we better do not talk about the speed we drove down there, overtaking other cars! What a relief once down at the first village.
He took me to a local restaurant that is famous for “grilled” fish. It was really interesting as it was again these clay ovens in the ground and the fish was grilled down in the amber. I also could try myself to roll the bread and “glue” it to the wall of the clay oven. Well, it needs some technique, but at least I entertained the staff of the restaurant - being a woman! We had lots to laugh at - and probably lots of Snapchat videos!
The fish was delicious - and easy to eat with one hand! Just breaking the bread I need still two hands ...
After dinner, it was time to get up that road again! No need to mention I was glad once we were back on top! He still went with me a bit around the area as this is one of the main hobbies of the population - driving around, parking and enjoying the view! We had a short visit to a nice viewpoint over Abha, where a lot of cars were parked for that reason.
Back “home”, Bader and his friend came and an uncle who was already over 80 years old! He didn't look like that! The boys started their Shisha ritual and as I was pretty tired of today I went soon to bed - I still occasionally could hear the boys giggling - I wonder what they were adding to their Shisha ;-)
The next morning, still cloudy with rain showers, I went to visit the area of Al Habala. What a stunning area, full of canyons! I guess here you can easily find hiking tracks and places to camp - I didn't see any baboons around. Not sure if it is still their area or if it was the rain… As I enjoyed that area so much I roamed around the edge, when possible, on offroad tracks. I even saw flowing rivers - how amazing and what a difference that rain makes to the area.
At one river I stopped to take a picture (leaving my helmet on) and a car stopped. The guy, military, started talking to me out of the car and then he said “I need to hug you bro´”. While he got out of the car I took the helmet off and he was even more surprised to see a woman! Before he even drove off, after the picture, I think I was already viral on Snapchat ;-)
Back to the house, I was all afternoon on my own so I had plenty of time to catch up on messages and the blog. When I was already wondering if anybody would turn up, Shaker came to get me to go to Bader's house, just across the road as they will cook for me tonight camel meat. Wow, how amazing is that!
During the cooking, the boys watched football as it seems to be also very popular here in Saudi Arabia - same as obvious everywhere in this world!
The camel, a young one as the meat is still juicy, was delicious. The consistency reminded me a bit of the meat in a stew or Gulasch. However, if I had to say anything about the taste, it would be difficult for me as I am not a meat eater. I think if you would provide me with a stew of a camel and a cow, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference ;-) However, it was delicious and a really lovely gesture by the boys for my last evening! As I will not see them tomorrow morning, I said then later already good-bye to Bader and his friend.
The next morning I headed to Najran, close to the border of Yemen. Originally I wanted to go to Farasan Island for beach and camping, but the weather forecast continued to be bad, with a lot of rain. The locals loved it, but I wanted to camp and hopefully have a dip in the sea, so Farasan was no option. Also, the plan was then to visit the villages around Fayfa, but due to the weather, I didn't want to risk not finding accommodation around, as I couldn’t locate anything on Google or booking. So that left me with Najran.
As Shaker was still asleep I sent him a message when I had a cafe at the fuel station leaving Abha. It was a nice ride, with still a panoramic landscape. The weather was still cold and raining. Later on, I forked off towards Najran via backroads and the landscape changed to more vast areas in the mountains. Only coming closer to Najran and the border of Yemen it got again full of mountains - and the weather got better, definitely warmer; in Najran I arrived at 24ºC! Being so close to the border there was a military checkpoint on a crossroad as the road leads into Yemen. In Najran I finally found a hotel and luckily they gave me a special price.
I hope you enjoyed as well the time in the mountains as much as I did :-D Also that is for the moment the furthest South - until Oman, Inshallah! Whilst you are waiting for the next blog, have a lovely freshly brewed mint tea.
Places | Cities:
Abha, Rijal Alma, Najran.
Driven km | Trip:
Total | Steffi: 27085 km
Information Border Crossings:
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Maintenance | Breakdown:
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Health issues:
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Special thanks to:
Shaker, Bader and his friends to look so fantastic after me.
The stunning area around Abha!