Sunday 9th April 2006

Rhona said we (as a group) must start checking out at 7.30 a.m. as we need to be ready to leave by 8.15 a.m. ON THE DOT, and it may have taken that long for us all to check out! So, I estimated Sima and I would need to get up at 6 a.m. (urrgghh!) as the previous morning for both of us to get showered, dressed and eat breakfast had taken us an hour and a half! We both decided to get all our packing done as far as we could the night before and shower and wash our hair too so that all we had to do the next morning was have a quick wash. So we settled on 6.15 a.m. as the time we should get up. I did not want to miss out on pancakes and maple syrup again and all those lovely pastries!

As it happens, check out was a lot quicker than Rhona had anticipated, and the 4 x 4 drivers were actually early (a nice surprise after the laid back lateness of the coach drivers and them not knowing where they were going and not speaking much English!) The three air-conditioned brand new 4 x 4’s were to take us to Jebel Akhdar, or the “Green Mountain”. We got into them with all of our luggage, four of us in two of them, and three of us in the last one. I was in a 4 x 4 with June, Mary and Peter. Our driver introduced himself as Mohammed, and he spoke very good English. We found out later he seemed to be in charge of the other two drivers, and we were actually in the “lead car”. We asked him to check he knew where we were going. He clearly said, “We are going to Nizwa”, which instilled us with some confidence.

We arrived at the “Golden Tulip” Hotel outside Nizwa about an hour and a half later – to pick up two more people (who were also with Omantravel) who were joining us for the journey to Jebel Akhdar. We stayed at the hotel for coffee and a comfort break, and then we were on our way again. We soon began to climb the mountain, on a fairly steep, winding road. We had not gone very far at all when there was a Military Police checkpoint. I wondered if they were going to check our passports or something, but actually, they are there to make sure ONLY 4 x 4’s proceed past that point, and that the driver is experienced, the vehicle is in good order with plenty of oil and water etc, and they gave us each a leaflet to explain this. (I was reminded of our visit to the Eagle’s Nest – only experienced coach drivers are allowed past a certain point – members of the public are not even allowed to drive up the road to the Eagle’s Nest, with its hairpin turn and sheer drops, etc). The road to Jebel Akhdar has a number of hairpin turns as well. The road became very twisty and steep, but Mohammed took all the corners very slowly and carefully. He is a very good driver and I felt very safe with him at the wheel. The road itself was quite new, in a very good state of repair, with sturdy concrete crash barriers along most of it, especially where there were steep downward slopes away from the road.

Again we noted how the stunning rock formations had literally been blasted away to make way for the road in places. One can only wonder about how they decide on the route these roads must take in order to climb the mountain! We could see the drill holes in the face of the rock. I was very glad to be seated in the middle of the back seat as the sheer drops were on either side sometimes, it seemed, and the road went up and also down in places too. I thought I had seen steep hills in San Francisco! I felt a little uneasy as I do not like heights, but I certainly felt safer than that drive through the Atlas Mountains in Morocco, and as I said, Mohammed is a very good driver.

We stopped a couple of times to take photos of the utterly breathtaking and awe-inspiring view. Then there was a short descent into a valley but we must have been by now a fair height above sea-level, in the depths of the mountains. I wondered if before the road existed, was this a hidden, remote, almost forgotten community? But no, Jebel Akhdar actually seemed like a fair sized town. We passed the town’s one and only (we presume) three star hotel, the Jebel Akhdar Hotel, and I realised that is where we were staying later on, but for now we continued on to another breathtaking photo opportunity, down a dirt track with another steep drop on one side…(eek!) It was a stunning, deep, rocky canyon, and on the opposite hillside we could see a little village with houses but in amongst the buildings we could see green terraces where the villagers were doing small scale farming. The quietness and tranquillity was amazing to behold, so deep in the canyons, or Jebals. I wondered why the people would think of building a village there in such a remote, difficult to access, location? Mary said they were probably born there, and so the people just stayed there, living off the land, but they must need to be fairly self-sufficient.

We drove a little way back in the direction we had come, stopping briefly at a Mosque for a comfort break – with a very uninviting “Turkish toilet!” Then we turned off down another route. We came out on the opposite side of the canyon to where we had been earlier, actually arriving at the village we had been able to see from the other side. The road came to an abrupt end and so the 4 x 4’s parked up and we continued on foot. The village is called “Al Aqor”. Down little alleyways and streets not wide enough and too steep for cars, between houses and even through tunnels, we came out just above where some of the roses were growing. There were also other crops including oats, wheat and barley. Once again the peace and tranquillity out there were simply awe-inspiring. We walked along a footpath a little further, and out there on the hillside was quite a big area devoted just to the roses. There was also quite an extensive irrigation system of gullies for the water. You could actually smell the scent of the roses in the air, and we remarked how, in Morocco, the scent in the air where the roses were growing as hedges, we did not remember it being anywhere near as strong as that in the air. Only when we went to the Biolandes factory and the roses were laid out on the floor did we smell the scent in the air, but that obviously was stronger at the time. The variety of the rose looked just like the pink Rosa damascena we recognized from Morocco, however. We took lots of photos including some unusual but interesting looking bugs!

Then we walked a little further, across a deep, rocky channel which I could only imagine was a dry river bed (but quite narrow, climbing down one side and up the other by use of stones sticking out of the wall). There were more crops and another area of roses. Some of our group kept going but that was close enough to the edge of the canyon for me! We made our way back through the rose fields and the village, back to the 4 x 4’s. Next, we drove a short way to another viewpoint and picnic area, and here we stopped for our picnic lunch. BSP dining again in style, wait until we tell them back home! We had brought the leftover rolls, Pringles, etc. from the day before, picked up fruit and pastries from the morning’s breakfast, and Colin and Jean, the two people who had joined us, had added a box of apples, more rolls and cheese to the pile of food in the centre. We were sitting in a round shelter with seats, while we ate. There were also boxes of biscuits – cream filled biscuits with pink and lime green fillings! And a box of date-filled biscuits, rather like fig rolls but with dates, and the biscuit surrounding the dates was very soft, more like shortbread. They were delicious!

After lunch Peter revealed that he had collected some of the roses in a small, clear bottle he had brought with him, and was actually going to demonstrate his technique for us in the form of a field extraction! The solvent he used was 4-4, tetrafluoroethylene, and by use of removeable aerosol valves, he managed to pressurise the container and then added a quantity of the solvent. The solvent extracts the aromatic principles, but it is an extremely cold process, so possibly different combinations of aroma molecules are extracted than in the more conventional methods of processing. Peter then used another empty aerosol container, and by pressing the two valves together, the solvent with the dissolved rose aroma molecules was transferred from one container to the other. By releasing some of the pressure, the solvent began to boil, and it evaporated off (Peter said usually in the industrial process he recovers the solvent but clearly he cannot do that here as this is “field kit”, he does not have the facility. The liquid was cloudy as this was pure rose oil. The solvent boils at –26 C. After a few seconds, Peter released the valve altogether and allowed the solvent to boil off naturally, handing the vessel round so people could assist the “boiling” with the heat of their hands and the vessel certainly felt very cold! As the solvent evaporated away we could see yellow droplets of the pure rose oil around the insides of the glass vessel. It smelled really fabulous – rich, fresh, rosey and intense. This was a very impressive demonstration.*

We returned to the 4 x 4’s and we drove away, arriving back down the dust track at the first viewpoint, on the other side of the canyon. Again we went into the labyrinth of streets and alleys, to the place where they distil the roses. We did not know what to expect, but what we found was the most unbelievable method of processing the roses! We walked past a number (maybe six) of large gas canisters (of a similar size to those we use for G.C. work or slightly fatter) and these turned out to be Calor gas. The gas was piped into two rooms where they do the extraction, using lengths of plastic/rubber tubing.

The first room was very dark, inside we could hardly see, and the heat was almost stifling! Everywhere was black – the floor, the low, heated stoves with the extraction vessels. As our eyes adjusted to the low level of light, we could see the orange glow of the flames beneath the stoves. The roses are packed into terracotta urn-like containers and the petals are wet by only a small amount of water when they go in, but not covered by water as is usual in water distillation. Inside the urn goes a small bowl, and then a lid goes on the top with cold water in it, so it seems to be a sort of self-contained distillation process! The copper lid on top containing the cold water assists in the condensation of the distillate. The bowl inside collects the condensate and they take the bowls out periodically and tip it into a larger bucket. This cooking process continues for two and a half hours. By the end of the process, the rose petals residue is charcoal black! The resulting liquid is brown, and with black specs of charcoal floating in it! As perfumers, we were surprised at this treatment of such beautiful rose flowers, the result being this brown liquid with a smokey aroma, but they assured us after three months or so maturation, the liquid develops a honey-like rose aroma. For myself, I could not stay there – the stench of burning charcoal was making me wheeze, but some of the others went back again to see them put the fresh roses in the pots, the beginning of the process. Sima went back four times and bought two of the bottles of liquid from the men! Peter went back for the third and fourth times and repeated the demonstration of his extraction technique to show them. We tried to explain to them, if they put more water in the vessels, the flowers would not end up so burnt, but they kept saying no, no, that made rose water, like they do in France, he said yes, he knew that process, they call it distillation, but he kept insisting no, this was rose oil he was making and he did not want to add more water to it as the resulting product would be too dilute.

We found out later that this product (whether it is rose oil OR water) has desirable medicinal properties and can be used in cooking and even sprayed around as an air freshener.

Afterwards we went to the Jebel Akhdar Hotel and checked in. Dinner that evening was in the restaurant of the hotel, and it was a buffet, with houmous and other salads to start with, carrot and coriander soup which was very nice, and the main course was a choice of Thai chilli chicken, steak, rice, and the dessert was a choice of blueberry cheesecake or fruit salad. However, everyone retired early to their rooms, as it had been a long but very interesting day.
 

*For further information on Peter Wilde's extraction process, his website is www.wildeandcompany.co.uk

Return to Oman Index