This photo sums up a little bit of Muscat, Oman .....
In the foreground a very traditional wooden dhow showing obvious signs of its time-honoured methods of construction, not unlike our own boat, Malaya. And in the background, one of the world's most modern, biggest, and probably most expensive super-yachts, the Fulk Al Salamah, one of two Omani Royal Yachts.
Not just boats either, modern apartment blocks are overshadowed by the well preserved forts, of which there are several around Muscat, showing the need here for good defences in bygone times.
We liked the look of Muscat as soon as we arrived, even before we had travelled the short distance into town where the mosques and souks (markets) were. Only one downside was that the Costa Mediterranea joined us from Dubai to add its multi-thousand passengers to our numbers in town, though the stall holders would no doubt be happy with the added custom.
On the opposite side of our ship though were two other rather impressive ships .....
Above is the Omani Royal Yacht Al Said, one of the world's biggest super-yachts when she was completed in 2008. At nearly 16,000 tons displacement, she's about half the weight of Boudicca. Soon after we arrived, two tugs helped this attractive super-yacht to leave port, whether with royalty on board or not we'll never know, but I took a bit of time-lapse video of the manoeuvres for fun.
To the right of that, the aforementioned Fulk Al Salamah, about 70% the displacement of Boudicca. When launched in 2016 she topped many of the lists for biggest super-yachts, though officially she's a support vessel to the smaller Al Said, replacing another ship of the same name which could carry up to 240 troops.
From the decks of Boudicca, we could see quite a lot of the port of Muscat such as the world's largest incense burner .....
Which has some particularly nice decorations on the surface, not obvious from a distance.
Various forts of different sizes .....
And this lovely mosque, though this was taken from the better viewpoint in town ....
We had one aim in Muscat, to visit the Mutrah Souk, i.e. bazaar, which we hoped would have a few things we wanted to buy. It fulfilled all our needs and, inevitably we came away with a few more things than we had intended. The entrance to the souk was not too intimidating ....
But a little way in was a five-way junction of alleyways, one of many, most of which had attractive roofs ....
Many of the alleys looked very similar .....
So it was quite easy to get hopelessly lost or wander round in circles seeing the same stalls over and over again. Quoting from Lonely Planet "That said, getting lost inside the souq is part of the fun.". But we found plenty of interesting places .....
Many of them veritable Aladdin's Caves with all sorts of tempting shiny things ...
Another short bus ride courtesy of Fred Olsen got us back to the ship and in due course the sail-away party with free rum punch. It was well attended (I suspect the free drinks ensured that) .....
But due to some administrative error, we didn't sail off into the sunset as intended, with the dance band playing, but stayed in the harbour, probably to the annoyance of the crew of the Fulk Al Salamah.
Next stop, Salalah also in Oman.
In the foreground a very traditional wooden dhow showing obvious signs of its time-honoured methods of construction, not unlike our own boat, Malaya. And in the background, one of the world's most modern, biggest, and probably most expensive super-yachts, the Fulk Al Salamah, one of two Omani Royal Yachts.
Not just boats either, modern apartment blocks are overshadowed by the well preserved forts, of which there are several around Muscat, showing the need here for good defences in bygone times.
We liked the look of Muscat as soon as we arrived, even before we had travelled the short distance into town where the mosques and souks (markets) were. Only one downside was that the Costa Mediterranea joined us from Dubai to add its multi-thousand passengers to our numbers in town, though the stall holders would no doubt be happy with the added custom.
On the opposite side of our ship though were two other rather impressive ships .....
Above is the Omani Royal Yacht Al Said, one of the world's biggest super-yachts when she was completed in 2008. At nearly 16,000 tons displacement, she's about half the weight of Boudicca. Soon after we arrived, two tugs helped this attractive super-yacht to leave port, whether with royalty on board or not we'll never know, but I took a bit of time-lapse video of the manoeuvres for fun.
To the right of that, the aforementioned Fulk Al Salamah, about 70% the displacement of Boudicca. When launched in 2016 she topped many of the lists for biggest super-yachts, though officially she's a support vessel to the smaller Al Said, replacing another ship of the same name which could carry up to 240 troops.
From the decks of Boudicca, we could see quite a lot of the port of Muscat such as the world's largest incense burner .....
Which has some particularly nice decorations on the surface, not obvious from a distance.
Various forts of different sizes .....
And this lovely mosque, though this was taken from the better viewpoint in town ....
We had one aim in Muscat, to visit the Mutrah Souk, i.e. bazaar, which we hoped would have a few things we wanted to buy. It fulfilled all our needs and, inevitably we came away with a few more things than we had intended. The entrance to the souk was not too intimidating ....
But a little way in was a five-way junction of alleyways, one of many, most of which had attractive roofs ....
Many of the alleys looked very similar .....
So it was quite easy to get hopelessly lost or wander round in circles seeing the same stalls over and over again. Quoting from Lonely Planet "That said, getting lost inside the souq is part of the fun.". But we found plenty of interesting places .....
Many of them veritable Aladdin's Caves with all sorts of tempting shiny things ...
Another short bus ride courtesy of Fred Olsen got us back to the ship and in due course the sail-away party with free rum punch. It was well attended (I suspect the free drinks ensured that) .....
But due to some administrative error, we didn't sail off into the sunset as intended, with the dance band playing, but stayed in the harbour, probably to the annoyance of the crew of the Fulk Al Salamah.
Next stop, Salalah also in Oman.
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