I Finally Went to Musandam, Oman!

I have literally dreamed of going to Musandam, Oman for many years including when I lived in Oman more than 10 years ago and when I found out I was going to live in the UAE. Musandam is a peninsula territory belonging to Oman but cut off from the rest of Oman by the UAE, so you drive through the UAE to get there. I've heard it described as the "Norway of Arabia" due to its geography. I've never been to Scandinavia, so I can't speak to how accurate the comparison is, but I did find Musandam stunning.

I went with a group of friends since M and I weren't sure if the boat would be safe for a kid as young as S. I asked the boat captain, though, and he said he'd given tours to families with babies as young as six months old! They usually just return to shore to overnight in a hotel instead of on the ship. That'll probably be what we do next time when we go as a family.

Thankfully, the tour operator we used took care of all the details once we got to Musandam. They had the boat, crew, food on board the ship, mats for us to sleep on underneath the stars, and even snorkeling equipment for us to use during the day all sorted. I love being out on the water, swimming, and snorkeling. In the shallower parts of where we stopped, the water was full of fish, sea urchins, anemones, coral formations, and oysters. It was such a beautiful sight; I could snorkel for hours!

On our way to and from different snorkeling spots, we saw multiple groups of wild dolphins. The ship captain and crew had a specific kind of whistle they would do to encourage the dolphins to come out and stay out as long as possible. The dolphins seemed to love swimming alongside the boat when it was moving faster, and I've never seen so many dolphins so close. They looked so playful swimming together.

At night, we went for a moonlit swim and were surrounded by bioluminescent plankton that activated around us as we paddled. The glowing was stunning, even though the water was way too cold for me. Once I got out of the sea and dried off again, I settled in to stargaze with friends. I can't remember the last time I saw so many stars, and it made me nostalgic for my childhood since I grew up on a flat-roofed house without much light pollution at all.

Although we didn't plan it this way, our Musandam trip also happened to coincide with the Geminids meteor shower and I saw the biggest shooting star I've ever seen in my life. It was so magical, I may have shed a tear or two.

Musandam has been on my bucket list for so long, I can't believe I finally got to experience it. Not only that, but I got to do it alongside some of my dearest friends in Dubai and plenty of new, delightful friends as well. I'll remember and cherish this trip forever.

Aw, Man! Our Long Weekend in Jordan is Over

It's been a long time since I put a pun in the title of a blog post! I'm probably feeling extra punny because we stayed with friends in Jordan for a long weekend and one half of the couple is a fellow punthusiast. (Our spouses may roll their eyes, but I'll never stop finding puns funny.) We decided last-minute to take a spontaneous trip to Jordan, somewhere we've been before but could go back again and again. This time, our main purpose was to visit friends and get away from Dubai for a little bit given I was off work and S's nursery was closed for a few days any way for Eid Al Etihad (the UAE's national day).

I love spontaneous travel and I'm glad we've still been able to do this sort of thing even after becoming a family of three. S is a seasoned traveling pro and loves flying on airplanes. We went to Jordan's capital, Amman, for a few days (and hence the title of this post). It was so literally and figuratively refreshing catching up with dear friends, spending time outside breathing the fresh, clear, cold (!) air, and eating delicious food at much more affordable prices than we have in notoriously expensive Dubai.

The other day, I had a conversation with M that I find my travel preferences definitely shifting as I get older. When I was younger, I always wanted something new that we'd never done before, with the focus on the freshness of the experience. Nowadays, I find myself wanting to travel to be with people we love whenever possible, even if that means returning to a place we've already been. With S's age, there are also certain things we just can't realistically do. (I was grateful M talked me out of trying to go to Petra not only because of a lack of time but because S would've probably asked us to carry him for hours and our arms would've fallen off. We'd much rather come back and do it later when he's older and can walk by himself for longer periods of time.)

I also didn't realize how many of my friends worked at U.S. Embassy Amman! We went to visit one group of friends, I caught up over lunch with more, and then I bumped into even more in the hallway at the embassy so we were able to meet up with them for dinner before we left. It was so nice, and we had an amazing, relaxing family trip. I went a little overboard purchasing plenty of scented soaps and dead sea mud products, so I'm sure I'll keep thinking about our time in Jordan every time I use them for a while yet!