Our tours in Oman were arranged by Sunny Day Tours, Travels and Adventure, which is a company we found buried in the back of the Lonely Planet. Our guide was fantastic, his name was Qais Al Maashari. He has fantastic English, very friendly, very professional, and was always exactly on time to pick us up.

The first tour we did with them was to Jebel Shams (“Sun Mountain”). Jebel Shams is a huge canyon in the mountains a couple of hours outside of Muscat. It is considered by some to be the “Grand Canyon of the Middle East”.

Getting there was mostly easy, driving along safe, paved roads. Only on the last bit up the mountain did the road change to dirt. We had considered doing this tour by ourselves, but we were worried about the road conditions. There are also some slightly confusing turns in the road – we read one story on the internet about someone making a wrong turn on the way there and ending up in an uncomfortable situation at a military checkpoint.

At the top, there is some very basic facilities available for campers, and some viewing spots right off the dirt road.

The accessible part of Jebel Shams is not actually the highest part of the mountain – that is reserved for the military.

The lunch that was provided for us was abundant and good. It was a cold picnic with sandwiches, fruit, etc. They did not have a problem providing food for Wendy, who is vegetarian. We ate at the top of the mountain under a shelter structure, although it really wasn’t very warm.