This ancient city, and the magical small towns in its surrounding countryside, were my main reasons for visiting Oman.
You want medieval Arabian towns built of mud bricks? Check! Magnificent fortresses of UNESCO World Heritage fame? Yes! An open-air marketplace of goats and camels supplied by nomadic Bedouins? It's got all that too, plus more.
To be fair Nizwa isn't a household name outside of Oman, itself an obscure country to most living outside of the Middle East. The capital city of Muscat is probably best known, especially to wine lovers for its namesake grapes. Even Salalah is somewhat better known regionally as the land of frankincense.
But Nizwa, an ancient caravan stop among the deserts of Central Oman, hasn't really made the international scene since the Middle Ages. It was once a great centre for learning in the Islamic world, and to this date remains religiously conservative and somewhat superstitious. That's night-and-day for me traveling in from aspiring postmodern and liberal Dubai.
Even today, Nizwa and neighboring Bahla retain the dubious reputation as the epicenter of black magic. Mention to your Omani coworkers about taking a trip there and they'd make jokes about you being turned into a donkey. Of course for me that's more of an attraction than a deterrent.
Failing to secure a long distance bus ticket from Dubai (coincided with the holiday of Isra and Mi'raj), I took the detour of a 9-hour bus ride to Muscat, then renting a cheap Nissan Tiida and sped into Nizwa in 2 hours courtesy of Oman's world-class highways. I arrived on Thursday night after Maghrib (Friday morning in Islamic terms) as the local men all gathered around the Grand Mosque for evening prayers.
This is the oasis city of Nizwa amidst its groves of life-giving date palms, sustained by an ancient system of ingeniously engineered underground aqueducts channeling water from beneath the rugged Hajar Mountains. This was once the ancient capital of Oman some 1400 years ago, and more recently the base of tribal insurgence against the Sultan of Muscat in mid 20th Century.
Dinner at the popular Bin Ateeq was somewhat underwhelming -- traditional seating on scruffy carpets with worn-down cushions, bland reheated food, and inflated prices compared to other local joints I later came across. This plate of Qabooli Laham (2.2 Rials / CAD$5.7), a local variant of biryani with braised mutton, could have been spicier even to this foreigner. But that wasn't the time and place for fine dining -- I was looking forward to getting some rest in preparation for a full day of sightseeing tomorrow.
Inconveniently located 5 kilometres from the Souq, Majan Guest House was initially chosen because it was the only place that bothered to return my emails. The price of 12 Rials (CAD$31) for a single room with bathroom, air conditioning and breakfast was very reasonable for affluent Oman, and the next night I did come back, with my newly acquainted Spanish friend, for a twin room for 15 Rials (haggled down from 17).
Fried eggs, toast, juice and coffee for a filling breakfast before setting out. Little did I know that I would need all that extra energy for visiting 5 different towns on the busy day ahead.
My number one priority within the old town was the Friday Goat Market, a bewildering open-air Souq which became one of my favorite memories of Oman and will be the subject of the next article. Number two was the mighty circular fort of Nizwa, defender of this crossroad of caravans between Muscat to the north, Buraimi to the west and Dhofar to the south.
Pictured is only the top third of an enormous cylindrical tower rising 30m above the ground, not to mention a foundation that burrows another 30m underneath. The present structure was built in the age of gunpowder artillery of the 1600's, hence the thick defensive walls with crenelations designed for cannons and muskets.
The only access into the fort is through a narrow and purposely winding passage full of death traps, amusing to tourists in peacetime but nightmares to would-be invaders as floor traps would open up beneath the feet and scalding concoctions of date syrup would be poured from above. A permanent supply of precious water was automatically available as the fort sits atop an underground stream. Any way you look at it, this place was, and probably still is, ready for battle.
The caretaker of the fort was in a jovial mood and gave me an English language guidebook for free, color-printed on glossy paper and all. This would be a short day of work for him as the entire town would soon close down, at 11:00 every Friday morning.
As impressive as the Fort of Nizwa was, that afternoon I came across the even larger and more spectacular Fort of Bahla, built entirely of mud bricks, 40 km to the west in the next town. At the time it was still undergoing its 25-year-long conservation repairs and could only be admired from the outside. That was one of the two UNESCO World Heritage Sites I visited in Oman, the other being the ancient canals of Falaj Daris.
Starting at 10:45 the Fort started to close, along with virtually every store in the town centre, as men came out from every neighborhood in response to prayer calls cracking out of the speakers of the Grand Mosque. All men congregated beneath the glittering dome of Nizwa's historical mosque and prepared for the weekly Jumu'ah.
With much of the population gathering at the mosque, it was the perfect time to explore the quiet authenticity of Nizwa's historic quarters, packed with alleys after alleys of rustic mud brick houses. Nobody aside from clueless foreigners like myself would venture out underneath the midday sun in August, when the temperature consistently rises above 40 degrees Celsius in these desert regions.
The affluent middle class had mostly moved to newer neighborhoods, leaving behind the underprivileged in these traditional dwellings of ancient mud walls and heavy wooden doors. Sooner or later these entire blocks of medieval history will be torn down in the path of progress, in a renewed city now boasting a university and a cluster of industrial operations.
Vestiges of Nizwa's glorious trading past live on in the pre-modernized East Souq, a claustrophobic maze of half-covered bazaars filled with the aromas of Dhofari frankincense and rosewater. Gathering at the Souq's courtyard was a group of elderly men with their prized hand-polished rifles, apparently some sort of local gun club.
My eyes were caught by the exquisite workmanship in these silver Khanjar daggers, a formal accessory worn by all self-respecting males in this traditional society. I almost wanted one except for the prices of OMR300 (CAD$780) ... and the potential inconvenience of flying back to Canada with an assault weapon in my luggage.
The Khanjars and traditional pottery were all fascinating, though I elected to shop for an easy-to-pack scarf to take home to my wife. Three hours at the Souq was definitely time well spent especially at the action-packed Friday Goat Market, which in itself made my visit to Nizwa worthwhile ...
