The Empty Quarter

We decided to venture out on a road trip to the Empty Quarter (Rub Al Khali) last weekend. This is the largest sand desert on earth, encompassing most of the southern Arabian peninsula, including a large part of the UAE and Saudi Arabia. British explorer Wilfred Thesinger made two famous crossings of the Empty Quarter from 1945-50, probably the first foreigner to do so, with help from local Bedu tribesmen. His journeys were immortalized in his book "Arabian Sands", just released in a new edition in honor of Thesinger's centenary year.

Book in hand, we headed the easy way, by car, to the place where we were staying, the Liwa Hotel, located in the middle of the Liwa oasis, which on the map looks like a green crescent to the north of the desert. From the hotel we got our first views of the endless expanse of massive sand dunes. These were not the white sand dunes of Dubai or the tan sands of Tybee Island off the coast of Georgia where I grew up, or even the dunes pictured in black and white in Thesinger's book. These dunes stretched to the horizon in colors of gold and red, with streaks in shades of salmon, highlighted against the blue sky. The most striking thing, in addition to the colors and vastness of the dunes, was the sand itself, which was blowing around fast and furious and finding its way everywhere. The hotel was evidently fighting a constant battle to keep sand out of the outdoor activity areas, with burlap sacks hung as barriers on the railing along the walkways. I had a hard time keeping it out of my eyes and mouth and found that it could be quite disconcerting.

There is now a modern highway leading from the coastal cities of Dubai and Abu Dhabi to the Liwa oasis, connecting the many farms and small towns of the Liwa oasis area. We were expecting something of an off-road adventure to get out in the middle of the dunes. But we were happy to find a new road, well-marked, going to the area we were looking for, called the Moreeb Dune (Tal Marib), famous for its huge, 300 meter tall dunes. There we discovered expansive flat areas nearby, on the sabkhas or salt flats that run between the dunes, set up so it appeared for desert races of all sorts, including off road vehicles, horses, camels and falcons. The area was largely deserted, with just a few tourists like ourselves, perhaps because a large competition called the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge had just concluded the previous day. We did get to watch a few people try to walk up the dune face--a couple actually succeeded--as well as a guy on a dune buggy going up and around and down. It looked like fun, but definitely not something we would try in a Mercury Mountaineer.

We hesitated to go off-road from there, although we saw some other jeeps doing that, since we had no one to help us if we got stuck. It turned out that there were many areas around the salt flats where it was easy to drive around off the main road. It was fun to get away from the road and imagine ourselves alone in the wilderness. We came across some camels on one of these forays, one of which came right up to our car and seemed much less concerned about us than we were about him! Leaving the car and walking out into the dunes and salt flats, we saw that they were much less barren than they appeared, with small green plants and yellow flowers, rabbits, lizards and insects. Unfortunately, there was also quite a bit of refuse, especially close to the road, including plastic bottles that will probably be there forever. We came across what looked like a burlap sack but turned out to be the hide of a dead camel. It was closer to decomposing than the plastic we saw, with its teeth crumbling to the touch of my shoe.

It's possible and easy to camp out in the desert, and we saw a few campers. Without a good tent, I wouldn't want to, what with all the blowing sand. But it is said to be a magical experience under the night sky. We took many pictures but they don't really capture what I saw in the dunes. Not like the cartoonish pictures I've always had in my head of "desert" and "oasis," but something entirely new, vast and awe-inspiring. Maybe a wide angle lens and filters would help, but it's really worth seeing for yourself.

How did all the sand get here? We don't know, but worth investigating. We get the National Geographic at home and will look for their feature in the February 2005 issue, which has some amazing pictures: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0502/feature1/index.html

After spending some time in the dunes, there's really not much else to see or do in the area beyond the hotel. The local gas station seemed to be the only other option for coffee, and a quite nice one at that (the gas stations throughout the UAE are very nice, like they used to be in the USA in the 60's with uniformed attendants waiting on your car). As we headed back to Dubai, we took a detour to visit a new resort that recently opened on the eastern end of the Liwa crescent, called Qasr Al Sarab. We looked into staying there but decided against it based on location (60 kilometers from the Moreeb Dune) and price (three times more than the Liwa Hotel). But having nothing else to do, we drove 10 kilometers off the main road to look around, and found it stunning. The interior was beautifully done and the views were amazing. (Whether they had problems with the blowing sand, I don't know.) We bought a few things in the gift store, this being the only place that we had found to do so, and the sales person told us that the resort cost $800 million to build! Obviously, the government of Abu Dhabi played a big role, given the need for a new 10 kilometer road off the main highway. But it was not even close to being full. (It might have been busier, as was the Liwa Hotel, during the Desert Challenge the previous week.) I imagine that the price of staying there, expensive as it might seem, was being subsidized by the state, so it was probably a bargain. Definitely worth considering if we ever make our way to the Liwa oasis again.

We also stopped at the Emirates National Auto Museum, which was on the way back to Dubai, but it was closed for no apparent reason. It was Easter Sunday, but in the UAE it was a regular workday--perhaps they were still in mourning for the recently deceased Sheikh Ahmed. We got glimpses of a massive globe on wheels and the world's largest wheeled caravan, but missed out on seeing the world's largest truck and the Mercedes in all different colors owned by the so-called Rainbow Sheikh. No match for the colors of the desert, I'm sure.