Into the desert....

Friday morning is the equivalent to the Western World's Sunday - When in the Middle East with time on your hands on a Friday a trip into the desert is in order!! Today we went DEEP into the desert - over 150 kms from Riyadh about 2 hours drive from our compound - the mission was to find Shark Teeth Valley and see what we could find! As it is advised that you do not venture into the sands with less than 2 other vehicles ( nice big comfy 4x4's with great air con!) we joined some other friends with our picnic and the co-ordinates in the Sat Nav ( no idea where these co-ordinates come from but they got us to the right place!)

My Trusty and often Bossy Driver for the day...

The trip there was pretty interesting - we seem to be following the oil pipeline! I'm guessing these photos are of a town(?) by the side of the road where all the workers eat, sleep and generally hang out

By now we were off-road and into the sands - passing a few goats en route - No cars, no people nothing - it was amazing....(especially for a Londoner used to constant hustle and bustle!)

Its really difficlut to achieve the sense of vastnest in a photo...

I really wanted DH to take lots of photos of me skipping up and down the dunes in a flowing maxi dress with a sunhat on but we were with too many other people who I didn't really know!!!

We found these amazingly bleached white Camel bones - they almost looked like driftwood from the beach they had been so bleach and dried out by the hot sun - I thought there was a real beauty to them....

The Desert is the one place outside of the compound that women don't have to wear the Abaya ( I'm sure we should still be wearing it but as it is very unlikely that you will see another Human Being for miles and miles off comes the cloak...)

We picnic-ed in the midday sun just like typical Englishmen and our search for Sharks Teeth was hugely successful - you sit on the Desert floor and slowly gently sift through the top layer of sand, just when you are about to give up finding anything....

Isn't it amazing to think these teeth would be MILLIONS of years old from when the Desert was an Ocean .... Fabulous Day!