Matt: Not unusual for me, I decided to go for a hike in the Hajjar Mountains of RAK this past weekend. Of course my trusty hiking buddy Lenny came along too. This was an adventure for us, because with our new found mountain companion, Karen, we'd mapped a vague route that has not been documented and that we'd certainly not tried before, using Google Earth.
We set out a few ways points around Jebel Sal on Google Earth, logged them on the GPS and printed of a screen shot of the area, then, with packs fully loaded we went exploring, to try to find a route up to a plateau, then loop back around to the wadi bed and along the track to our start point.
We met Karen at 8am in Wadi Bih, so that equaled an early start from Dubai - up at 6am, I seemd to get up earlier at the weekend than I do during the week, odd. We were on the rocks by 9am. Looking up at the route we planned to tackle from ground level, the ascent looked pretty straight forward. It proved to be hard going. It was a pretty steep ascent, from the moment we left the wadi bed we were climbing steeply towards the summit on very rugged terrain. We followed the ridge line that we'd seen on Google Earth which was all pretty safe. Walking along a mountain ridge provides you with great views on either side, you really do feel on top of the world, if not a little exposed.
A third of the way up.
It was hot, really hot for this time of year, nearing 30 degrees and the climb was providing no shade form the sun, after the first 90 minutes or so of climbing, we were looking toward the summit and a 200-300 metre rock wall that was between us and the goal, it started to look pretty impassable without ropes and safety equipment. We pressed towards this face, hoping to afford ourselves a better view. The terrain in this region can be exceedingly deceptive, what might look like a sheer cliff from a distance can sometimes be a reasonably safe clamber and what looks easy can prove impossible.
This shows the route we took to the summit
We closed on the wall and could gradually see ways of progressing, so we pushed on, loosely following a ridge and generally passing within 20-30 metres of our speculative way points. It was a great feeling to finally reach the plateau, a vaguely flat expanse opened up before us, with inspiring views all around, we breathed a sigh of relief and head towards way point 4, which was close an old mountain settlement. The village (Sal) was a lot bigger than any we'd seen before, nestled in a shallow dip between large peaks, just before a drop-off down a sheer cliff to the main wadi bed. A perfect spot for lunch before we hunted for the route down.
Sal Village
We'd heard from John Gregory, a long time resident and hiker of the UAE, that there was a path to descend from this village, but you have to understand that a path in these mountains is rarely a discernible entity, the odd shoe scuff, a lightly warn boulder from passage, the occasional small cairn/pile of rocks amid the natural piles of rock, is generally all you have to go on and with dust and rain storms to disturb these it's not like following a track.
We could discern no obvious route from our position, we explored a little but no avenues revealed what we sort and this extremely steep descent wasn't something we could tackle lightly. We'd mentally plotted a path and began our clamber down, constantly checking and reassessing our route options.
The descent, before we found the path
After an about 30-45 minutes of slow climbing we noticed a couple of local villagers crest the ridge above us on the opposit side of the gully and begin to descend our way. It was clear they were on the 'path' and the we...were not. Fortunately ours paths were to merge at which point we began to see those signed we had missed before, the mini rock cairns - these are difficult to see sometime when you're on the right path, when you're 50 metres or more off track, you really have no chance. So we were thankful to be on route and stomped on steadily to the end on the hike.
A friendly native lizard basking in the sun.
We successfully returned to the cars after about 4.5 hours of hiking and had discovered ourselves a new hike.
It's always exciting to explore new areas and discover new locations, you get a real sense of freedom and pride knowing that so few may have been there before you. But you do have to plan well and be prepared, a knowledge of the area, terrain patterns and geography helps too. Certainly not recommended for inexperienced hikers or the unfit.
