Wadi Shawka

16 Saturday Mar 2013

The swimming pool at Wadi Shawka

I mentioned in my last post that we spent some time recently at Wadi Shawka. I’m not sure exactly how to spell it because I’ve seen it spelled multiple ways including several different variations on signs in the village by that name you pass through to get into the Wadi. The best Wadis all seem to be in Oman but Wadi Shawka in the UAE has some great things about it. For one, it is very easy to get to from Sharjah and our home at the American University of Sharjah. The drive is only about an hour from AUS. You’ll want a little SUV to drive right up to the wadi but a car can easily make it within a few short kilometre hike to the pools. You can practically drive right up to the first of the permanent pools. The first pool is an algae filled swamp but right around the corner is a beautiful little pool perfect for swimming. The rock around the pool looks brittle and sandy but in reality its much like cement. This makes for some fun climbing and bouldering.

This second pool is really the only one worthy of a swim but a little hike deeper into the Wadi presents some interesting views and some good fun. The easiest way to get past that first pool is to swim across but you can climb over the rock face to the right. This is a pretty easy climb, in our first trip out with folks from AUS there were 4 year olds climbing over it. For those afraid of heights though there are a few tricky parts.

Jaron relaxing in a rock hammock soaking up some sun.

You can easily spend hours around this natural pool, swimming, jumping from the rock faces, bouldering around the outside of the pool or just plain relaxing. There is a tiny bit of graffiti and as usual a little trash. The next time we go out we will take a few garbage bags and spend an hour or so combing the place. Surprisingly, compared to other places we’ve been and considering how accessible this spot is, the trash is at a minimum. It may have something to do with the large sign at the entrance to the Wadi proclaiming large fines for littering. Somehow I doubt that though. I expect a few locals spend a little time taking care of it. So, “thank you” to whomever works to keep this place an enjoyable spot.

Camping is possible close to the pools but you’ll only find space for one or maybe two small tents. We had a much larger group. We setup camp under that no littering sign which is about 3 kilometres from the wadi. It has plenty of room for many tents and its right off the gravel road so you can pull right up. Wood is sparse so you have to bring your own for a campfire. We found a hollow 4 foot chunk of palm tree that we got started with a little lighter fluid. It burned beautifully and for hours. It took a while to really get going and we actually rolled it away from our fire pit because we thought it was only going to smoulder. Then we ended up dragging it back.

Lisa took enough video that I thought I’d see what I could do with iMovie. So here is a little video of our fun.

Repent, Forgive & Enjoy

09 Saturday Mar 2013

Posted by jrwmacdonald in Camping, Living, Outdoors, Religion, wadi

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It has been a few event filled weeks since I last wrote. They have included a couple trips out to a local Wadi and the dedication of the first purpose built LDS chapel in the Middle East. I want to begin my post with a few words about that dedication and the visit of Elder Jeffery R. Holland. To do that I need to start with a little background.

The new LDS chapel in Abu Dhabi

Twice a year the LDS church has a worldwide conference broadcast from Salt Lake City. The first weekend in April and the first weekend in October are the dates for these conferences. Strangely, they are some of my favourite weekends every year. The LDS people have, in part because of these conferences which have been happening for just shy of 200 years, developed an interesting love of the spoken word and beautiful music. As I write this I am listening to a long running LDS program called, well… “Music and The Spoken Word.” This program features the iconic Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Orchestra at Temple Square. Check out their youtube channel. This is what I’m listening to right now:

So, at each of these conferences we generally hear from each of the members of the quorum of the twelve apostles and the first presidency of the church, among others. Members of the quorum of the twelve apostles and the first presidency serve from the time they are called until their death. The longest serving member of the quorum becomes the president of the church. It is actually a fascinating form of ecclesiastical government. What I am getting at here is that we hear from these men quite a bit. Some of them have been serving as apostles longer than I have been alive! I’ve heard them all speak many times. My favourite among them is Jeffrey R. Holland. The content of his speeches and his delivery consistently combine to inspire me and to draw me in.

I was more than elated to find out that Elder Holland would come to dedicate the chapel in Abu Dahbi. Not only did we get to hear from him during the dedication but that evening he was the main speaker at a small devotional in Dubai. A rare opportunity to hear from him twice in one day and in such an informal setting. He did not disappoint. More than any words he could have uttered though was the sermon of his actions. Elder Holland is one of the younger members of the quorum at 72 but I expect he only arrived in Dubai the night before (that is a long flight). He not only spoke at length in the morning he returned to speak at length in our intimate devotional. We packed as many as we could into that little villa in Dubai. He spoke and then hung around to shake the hands of every member.

I debated whether to get in line to shake his hand. You could tell he was tired. Personally I’d have blown off that meeting and gone to the hotel for a nap if I was him. Eventually I decided I’d better go shake his hand. I may never have the opportunity to stand face to face with an apostle again. I was shocked at the power in his grip. He was still shaking hands when we left around 10pm. His schedule for the next two weeks will take him to a different country in Europe every day. I’m sure he will stick around to greet the humblest of members at every meeting. I’m struck by the love he has for the saviour. I think of Peter when Christ asked “Peter, lovest thou me?” and then counselled him to feed His sheep. I could not help but think that Elder Holland is doing what the saviour would have him do.

I should pause here to say that every one that spoke that day did an incredible job. The dedication of the Abu Dhabi chapel will rest in my memory as one of the most spiritually poignant experiences of my life thus far. This chapel represents answers to many prayers. I could not help but feel that God was pleased and smiling upon these people. May it ever remain so.

So what was it that Elder Holland said in the two sermons he gave? A good deal. I’ve mulled over his words these last couple weeks. In the devotional he recalled a conversation he’d had with Hugh Nibley at Brigham Young University many years ago. Brother Nibley suggested that all we really need to do in life is repent and forgive (slightly different than pay taxes and die). Elder Holland expanded on that sentiment, his first reactions to it and his growing understanding of it over time. I thought it a fitting message in an Islamic country – though I’m not sure that he planned it that way. The word Islam means submission to the will of God. From dictionary.com we learn that Islam comes from the “…root of aslama “he resigned, he surrendered, he submitted,” causative conjunction of salima “he was safe,” and related to salam ‘peace.'” So with our Islamic friends we wish to utterly submit to the will of God or repent and forgive. There is simplicity and power in this approach to life.

Elder Holland expounded on many beautiful doctrines that day. In the end I came away with the message to repent, forgive and enjoy. Though he did not say those words exactly, much of his message, I think, is summed up in that phrase. Should we endeavour to live the first principles we should have the privilege of enjoying all of life. This does not mean that life will be without upset, difficulty or long stretches of darkness. Yet, through submission there is at least peace.

So on to the joy of life. I played a game with the kids the other day and now they beg me to play it every night. Indeed we’ve played it nearly every night for the last few weeks. We call it Mission Impossible. Before bed the kids arrange the furniture in the dinning room and living room and then shut out all the lights. I take my place with a flashlight on the back of the couch at one end of the room and the kids begin after the count of 3 on the other end of the room. They try to sneak through the room to a pillow resting at my feet. If they can touch the pillow they win the game but if they are caught in my flashlight’s inner beam they are out. When I shine the flashlight I can’t move it around the room and the kids have to freeze while it is on. When I turn it off again I have to count to 3 slowly and out loud before I can turn it on again. The kids let me know if I’m counting too fast. Of course, the idea is to move from hiding place to hiding place during those 3 seconds. Then when you are in reach make a dash for the pillow.

The kids love this game and like to argue over who gets to deign the “course.” If you play this with your kids be warned that they are moving about in the dark rather quickly. We’ve had our fair share of banged heads and stubbed toes. Lilli got a bloody nose yesterday. They insist on playing despite the injuries. We’ve also found that it is no fun to be caught out too quick. The kids get at least a couple chances. If I catch them they have to spell a word properly before they get a do over. Well, the spelling test has actually given way to singing and dancing… they love that! Indeed, Lilli would probably be bored with this game by now if the singing and dancing in the flashlight’s glow hadn’t begun. She is probably the least successful at reaching the pillow.

We spent the night out at Wadi Shawka last weekend. It was spectacular. A great fire with good friends. Joe brought his Ukelele and we sung late into the night around the camp fire. We had a big group out again for this camping trip. Watching a near full moon break over the horizon to dim the view of a starry sky was as usual breathtaking. The next day we hiked into the Wadi and spent hours swimming in the biggest pool and bouldering the rock faces around it. Jaron and I went exploring a ways up the river bed and then made the brave or possibly foolish move of taking an alternate route back to the pools. Jaron insisted that we climb up the mountain and follow the thin goat track along the cliff face inches from sudden death. I naturally can’t refuse my children anything. That little experience has demonstrated that Jaron is as reckless as his old man. He has the same “whats on the other side of that hill” fascination. I couldn’t help but think “is this what my friends have put up with all these years?” How many times have I led people into difficult situations because of my insistence that that mountain could be climbed, or that ravine ought to be explored…? I can only hope that it works out as well for my son as it has for me. Geez it is kind of annoying though – sorry guys.

Lisa took all the pictures and she is in Abu Dhabi tonight as a leader at the church youth conference. Hopefully, she’ll write a little more about the wadi and post the pictures and videos she took. We wish we could share all the great times we are having with friends and family at home. You are all missed.

A first night apart

16 Saturday Feb 2013

Posted by jrwmacdonald in Camping, Living, Outdoors, UAE

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Yesterday after church about 25 men and a few young men rode off into the desert for a guys night of desert camping. What happens when you send a bunch of men into the wilderness who are eager to recapture some of their youth and a few boys eager to be men? Well, potentially a good deal. Thankfully, Our night was relatively uneventful but satisfying. It was an interesting cultural experience too. A Canadian, two Americans an Ozzy and a large group of Filipinos go camping in the desert… what’s the punch line?

I’m not sure where they got it but the night featured a 15kilo suckling pig roasted

picture by Edmond Meshi C. SanBuenaventura

methodically on a spit over a bed of coals. They filled the belly with garlic and herbs and sewed it up for the roasting. I’m going to have to do this myself sometime in Canada. It was delicious.

There were a few scorpions but no stings. A stuck 4×4 but no permanent damage. A gorgeous evening sky with shooting stars and satellites ( the occasional 747 too). A brilliant crescent moon descending beneath the horizon prompted a run to the top of a large sand dune in pursuit and then an hour swapping stories with the Ozzy as we watched the glow of the campfire below.

The sweet but mournful ukelele was lovely to listen too. It was later supplanted by the rhythmic experienced strum of a guitar. Classic soft rock from the 70s, 80s and 90s brought back some excellent memories and certainly created a great new one. Our Filipino friends knew the lyrics to every song. Turns out karaoke is extremely popular in the Philippines.

I realized as I crawled into my sleeping bag that this was the first night I’ve been away from the family since arriving in the UAE. It is now Saturday afternoon and I am alone in the house. Lisa got on a bus with the kids this morning going to Abu Dhabi. The bus will take them to a well know mosque for a tour and then on to the other big cultural experience in the UAE, a mall. They should be back around 4pm and I can hardly wait to hear all about it. I expect Lisa will post something about the experience.

I miss the pines and spruce, the clear streams and green hillsides of my home. Yet, I’m learning to love the desert.

Desert Dwelling

25 Friday Jan 2013

Posted by jrwmacdonald in Camping, Outdoors, UAE

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It is always fun to see camels meandering along the road. This may be because they

This picture is actually from a camping trip in December

are still so foreign looking to us. Seeing a moose or bear in Canada was always novel (just because the experience is relatively rare) but a horse or cow is simply part of the landscape. Camels are ultimately a part of the landscape here but they are still, after only 4 months, a novelty. We haven’t had the chance to ride one yet but rest assured I won’t be leaving the Middle East without a camel ride. Why am I talking about camels? Well our adventures of late have included quite a few camel sightings.

With our intrepid friends the Palmers we ventured out into the desert last Saturday to play with the kids in the sand dunes. We did a little driving in the sand which stresses me out to no end. If I had a vehicle that was meant for that kind of driving I think I would enjoy it but with the constant threat of getting stuck in the desert with a car full of kids hanging over me like a guillotine my cortisol levels are way too high to truly enjoy the ride. Nonetheless we found some excellent sand dunes to play in.

The Palmer and MacDonald clans enjoying the sand

As a kid my scout troop would raise money every year by filling and selling sand bags. I have great memories of running all over the giant piles of sand we used to fill the bags. The dunes here are much larger and a great deal of fun. So we resolved to come back at the end of the week to do some camping.

On our way home we ran across some locals with their dogs at a camel race track. The dogs were Salukis, which are one of the oldest known domesticated dog breeds. They look built to run and these locals looked like they were getting set to make them do just that. The men had rigged a long metal beam to the top of their jeep and from the end tied a dead rabbit. Surprisingly, Lilli didn’t put up much of a stink about the poor rabbit. She wants a rabbit. Mainly, I think, because she’d like to name it Arnab (which is Arabic for rabbit). Anyway, with the rabbit dangling from the metal pole they would drive down the outside of the track with the metal beam and its rabbit sticking out over the track and the dogs in hot pursuit. I suggested to the kids that we should let Bonnie and Clyde race but for some reason they didn’t think that was a good idea – one of the other dogs might mistake them for a rabbit. Bridget captured a video of the dogs sprinting down the track – if you look carefully you can see the rabbit skipping along in front.

Generally when we go camping on a weekend we invite tons of people. More often than not one or maybe two families actually join us. This long weekend we had 8 besides ourselves. Of course, this made for quite the enjoyable occasion. After work on Wednesday I came straight home to pack the vehicle and lead the way. The Palmers were off work before us and led another family out to the place we’d found on Saturday. So it was up to Lisa and I to lead the rest. With a bit of a false start getting away from the gas station we all made it out to the desert. One family only had a two wheel drive rental vehicle but managed to get through the sand to the… “campground,” random spot in the desert, the place we decided to pitch our tents.

A morning view from the top of the sand dunes overlooking camp.

That two wheel drive made it out no problem but we spent a couple hours the next morning digging them out. After several attempts at pulling them out a local came by with a beat up old truck and managed to get them to solid ground. Of course, he snapped one of the two tow ropes we had in the process. Being that it wasn’t my vehicle stuck in the sand it was all pretty exciting. I did feel bad for Paul during the ordeal with his three kids, one just a baby. In the end we were all safe and sound just super dirty. This was Paul and Michelle’s first camping trip in the UAE… perhaps one of their first camping trips ever. Michelle had a roasted marshmallow for the first time! Maybe they don’t have marshmallows in Ireland? 🙂 Getting their vehicle stuck in the sand was a great introduction to camping… they won’t soon forget the experience. Now if we can get them to practice a little cognitive dissonance they may join us again. They were fun to have along so I hope they do.

I’ve been looking to spot a Camel Spider since we got here and felt optimistic about our

Can you see the scorpion in the house Jaron and his friend made?

chances on this trip. Alas no Camel Spiders but I did catch a gecko and even better a fairly nice sized scorpion. Jaron and his friend had a great time with the scorpion – they tortured… I mean played with it for at least an hour. They even built it a little “house,” hiding place out of sticks for it.

We discovered that a body board makes a great sand dune sled. My skim board wasn’t much fun, to my disappointment. The next time we’ll leave the skim board at home and bring the body board. It gets cold at night in the desert but we were comfortably warm in our new sleeping bags and on our new two-inch backpacking sleeping mats. Well kirsten was a little cold… we’ll have to find her a fleece liner for her sleeping bag.

Surprise you’ve been cuddling with a scorpion all night.

We are fairly confident that we have the majority of the camping gear we need for our European camping trip this summer. Just a few more small things and we should be all set. Anyone want to join us for a backpacking trip through Italy and France in June?

UAE National Day

03 Monday Dec 2012

Posted by jrwmacdonald in Camping, Outdoors, UAE

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Happy Birthday to the United Arab Emirates – affectionately known as the UAE. The UAE is a federation of emirates or small kingdoms each headed by their own Emir (a hereditary position like a king). The Emir of each emirate is an absolute monarch and the constitution that binds the seven emirates together really just spells out the relationship between the 7 participating emirates. There is a president of the country, who is chosen from among and by the seven rulers. I actually do not know quite as much about the politics of the country as I ought to – living here and all. i have learned a remarkable amount over the holiday though, for instance:

The UAE turned 41 on December 2nd.
The colours of the flag: red, green, white and black
The rulers faces looks strangely good plastered on the side of a white SUV – and they were on a ton of SUVs
You may not be able to drink here but that doesn’t stop anyone from driving recklessly
Driving and getting stuck on the beach is a national past-time

See how educated I am now.

We decided to spend National Day camping on the beach with our good friends the Andersons. We returned to Sandy Beach and Snoopy Island. We had such a good time on the Islamic new year we thought we just had to give camping there a try. We should have realized it was going to be chaos.

The first glimpses of the Gulf of Oman are always exciting. As we came around a bend

Looks like a refugee camp

in the road though and looked down on the “family campsite” that hugs the coast for several miles before one gets to Sandy Beach our excitement turned to: fear, wonder, apprehension, ashes in our mouth? None of those work really. I suppose one could describe it as the feeling you get when you are about to embark on something adventurous where the outcome will be almost assuredly unpleasant but also strangely captivating and memorable. The beach was absolutely packed with campers. It looked just like what one might imagine a refugee camp to look like.

There were an odd assortment of tents, trailers, and other contraptions. Residents erected fences of mesh or tarp to block out their neighbours. There was even a fifth wheel with a tent trailer on its roof. The neighbour to our left ran a generator all night to power his fluorescent lights. The neighbour to the right had a trailer (not a camp trailer but a steel box trailer) with a railed sitting area on the roof. At one point (around 11pm) he began grinding metal for something and spent several hours doing it. We had a few arabic gentlemen that could not get enough of driving their 4x4s on the beach. ATVs and dune buggies also made their way up and down the chaos.

There was an assortment of music. The Arabic and Hindi melded together at strange points. Occasionally claps and shouts could be heard as people attempted to dance to the music. Fires flickered up and down the beach as a massive orange moon rose out of the gulf to light the party. It was, a fascinating… cultural experience.

So we spent a strange night of intermittent sleep on the beach. In the morning as we climbed from our tents we watched the sun burst from the ocean. I don’t suppose that I could ever get tired of that scene. A good number of people left in the night or early

Hundreds had already cleared out by dawn

hours of the morning. Why they needed tents if they never intended to use them for sleeping I can only guess. Those guesses lead to no good ends though so I’ll pretend they simply had to be to work early in the morning. They, of course, left all their trash on the beach. It wasn’t long though before workers, from the neighbouring resort I presume, were there to pick up the larger pieces of litter. I watched as one of those workers carefully set aside items he could reuse: a half a bottle of instant coffee, a decorative box that probably once held cigars and an assortment of other treasures. He saw me watching him though and asked if I wanted any of these things he was setting aside.

The kids were in the water as soon as they were out of the tent. It wasn’t long before they were pulling strange things out of the water: a starfish, a Heineken bottle…

I bought the kids a skim board and a boogie board the other day. Kirsten wiped out pretty good on the skim board. She is still complaining of being soar. I took a few stellar falls myself. As I drug myself out of bed this morning I realized that I’m older than I used to be…

Lisa and I swam out to Snoopy Island with Jeremy Palmer (his family joined us in the morning – a wiser family than ours). This time I had a pair of fins and a proper snorkel. I tried the snorkelling mask but my nose being plugged really messed with my head. So Lisa used the mask. We encountered as many as half a dozen turtles each about a foot to two feet across. You could swim right up to them. I was tempted to grab a hold of them and see if they’d pull me along under the water. Turtles can bite I’m sure so I thought twice about that and let them be. It was fun just to swim with and watch them.

There were tons of Jellyfish in the water. We swam through several… schools, swarms, what the heck do you call a clump of Jellyfish? Well, according to Dictionary.com they are called a: smack, brood, smuth, smuck or fluther of Jellyfish. So we swam through many a fluther of Jellyfish and took quite a few stings. I was stung in the armpits, along my arms, my back and oddly enough even around my mouth. Apparently you should not kiss a Jellyfish. After 6 or 7 hours in the water the waves pushed these fluthers of Jellyfish into shore and we were forced to abandon our water adventures for the day. I should say that the stings, while leaving the occasional mark, were not much worse than a prickle and the majority of them were about the size of a fingernail. I did encounter quite a few bigger than my hand too. Jaron got stung in the leg but clearly it wasn’t too painful; he absolutely refused to let me pee on him.

Lisa drove for the first time in the UAE. I was very grateful too sleep the last hour of the trip home. She obviously did a fine job driving because I did indeed sleep. I think I woke up for nearly every traffic circle though just in time to have a small heart attack before returning to sleep.

Today we found a text message on our cell phone from the Emir of Sharjah wishing us a happy National Day. You know, it was a happy National Day. Thanks for being such an awesome country UAE and thanks to the rulers for continuing to provide a land of peace and prosperity, Insha’Allah.