Saudi Arabia – Asir (Abha), Al Baha
The wide, 23 km long, 2-lane road from Al Bahah to Dhee Ayn was a marvel of engineering as it descended down rugged cliffs to the bottom of the valley. Tunnels and bridges surmounted any difficulties. Even the rock faces above the road were stabilized in a very sophisticated way. The drivers were crazy and were always passing the few trucks and slow drivers on double solids.
Dhee Ayn (Zee Ain Heritage Village in Al-Baha Region) (08/04/2015), is visible for several kilometers as one approaches the village. Even from a distance the place can easily be located by the white glow. The houses of the village itself are not made of marble, but of flake stones and slate. Instead, the village got the moniker “Marble Village,” for the rocky outcrop it is built upon.
The outcrop is a gleaming rocky hill of white marble, which stands in sharp contrast to the grayish dark slates that the houses are constructed and the gray mountains that tower behind the outcrop. Green fields are in the foreground.
The 400-year old village was abandoned 30 to 40 years ago. It has been completely reconstructed and “looks new” with new doors and windows, but it is impossible to tell what is new and what is old. The stone houses climb the hillside and are accessed by wide stairs. Some are 4-stories high with internal stairways. Terraces are common. Inside the roofs are wood beams supporting small log and flat cement roofs. Free
The road to the village has several historical stone and slate towers. Al-Bahah Province is known as the region of 1001 towers, once built to protect villages, roads, and plantations from rivaling tribes. Today, these towers are abandoned, and many of them are partially or completely in ruins.
Since the above Wikipedia entry, the site has been completely rebuilt and looks like it all happened yesterday.
Day 4
From Dhee Ayn to Rijal was almost 600 km on another marvelous Saudi 4-lane divided highway. There were many gantries with radar cameras on the 120 k/hour roads but none were turned on. I averaged at least 120 as there was little traffic. The speed bumps were a real problem. The road passed through an agricultural area with almost every small truck carrying hay bales.
SAUDI ARABIA – JIZAN & NAZRAN
However, when I got to the supposed heritage village, there was none. I had waymarked Rihal Ayn, a nothing village in the far southwest that appeared to be on the way to Hima WHS.
I then put in Hima on Google Maps – 300 km east and over 4 hours of driving. The road got off to a good start climbing steeply over the mountains to the east. Most of the incline was so steep, I was wondering if my little Kia would make it. On top was a village, then a steep decline to the valley floor. The next 150 km continued the same: winding 2-lane roads with innumerable speed bumps that climbed up and over 2 more passes. The terrain was rugged mountains just north of the Yemen border. There were multiple military checkpoints.
The last 100 km of the drive was on dream SA roads. When I got to the waymarked Hima Cultural Area, it was in the middle of a residential neighborhood in Najran. I Googled Hima and learned that it was 128 km north of Najran. Boy, what a screwed-up day. But I did get to some nice Saudi landscapes especially the rugged mountainous area in the SW of the country next to the Yemen border.
So I continued driving despite having no break or food since breakfast. Wikipedia had the map coordinates.
Ḥimā Cultural Area WHS. Just put on the WHS list in 2021, I was looking forward to finally seeing this rock art site. I could only find the location from Wikipedia – 18°14.555″ 10″N 44°27’06″E. There were no signs anywhere on the route as the road passed through the Empty Quarter. When I arrived, there again were no signs except a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire and an “Archaeological Site – Entry prohibited” sign. F**k me. I couldn’t believe it after driving for 6 hours on challenging roads. I started to back up and almost ran into a jeep with two officers that had pulled up behind me. With big guns and no English, it became apparent I had to leave. They pointed down the road. I drove through a gate to an area with two old deep stone wells but could find only some very underwhelming minimal pecks in the rocks. However, the chain-link fence had a gap between it and the rocks and I went in. The area of pictographs is quite small, basically a 15m long wall about 1.5m high but covered in petroglyphs. The majority is a script of many lines of closely spaced characters. There were a few anthropomorphic figures, a camel, an ibex, a tree with “exploding fruit”, and some “crosses”. I took some photos and felt happy that the day’s adventure had not been in vain. Free
Here is the Wikipedia post – it bears no relation to what I saw and seems to describe another area or more petroglyphs near that I would need time to explore to find.
Bir Hima is a rock art site in Najran province, in southwest Saudi Arabia, about 200 kilometres (120 mi) north of the city of Najran. An ancient Palaeolithic and Neolithic site, the Bir Hima Complex covers the time period of 7000–1000 BC. Bir Hima contains numerous troughs whose type is similar from North Arabia to Yemen.
The ancient history of human occupation of this habitat is credited to its resources of wildlife, water, and limestone terrain. Saudi Arabia’s rock art, which has found appreciation in recent years, is considered among the richest in the world along with other examples found in Australia, India, and South Africa.
Apart from petroglyphs, carving tools used for this artwork (in the form of chopper or pebble tools) were also found here, made of such materials as quartzite, andesite, and flint. The images appear to have been inscribed with Bronze. The petroglyphs noted, when initially found in the 1950s, consisted of daggers and swords, bows with arrows tipped with transverse arrowheads, sickle swords, and throw-sticks. These depictions were interpreted as symbolic of spiritual animism.
Bir Hima, as part of Najran, is a treasure trove of petroglyphs, eclipsed only by those found in the Jubba region. Here, 100 sites have been identified. In the Najran area, as many as 6,400 human and animal illustrations, which include more than 1,800 camels and 1,300 human depictions, have been recorded. At this important rock art site, apart from depictions of humans, giraffes, and other animals, the sixth-century inscriptions of Dhu Nuwas, a Himyarite King who occupied Najran, are also recorded. A number of articulated camel fragments were excavated at site 217-44. While its engravings are probably much earlier than those of Hunters Palette, the Bir Hima warrior, armed with a bow, is almost identical to the men on the Hunters Palette. Thousands of inscriptions have also been found, in various scripts including the al-musmad alphabet, Aramaic-Nabatean, South Arabian, Greek, and Islamic.
It was then another 250 km drive to Abha. I was pretty tired with still 115 km to go, could find no stores open to buy food, so slept in a large dark area. This area is much higher and refreshingly cool at night with no mosquitoes and a great breeze. I ended up having a great sleep and was up at 5 am to drive to Abha.
Day 5
ABHA
Al Rajhi Mosque (Tahweel Al Rajhi). This two-minaret mosque has a huge prayer room – all an unremarkable white inside, a rectangular ceiling, and a huge crystal chandelier.
Shadda Palace was the main ruling palace in Abha, It was established around 1820. It has been extensively renovated and has now been converted to a museum. It has a selection of traditional utensils, furniture, and others. From the outside, it is a large palace with 2 minarets and white with brown accents on the roofline
Rijal Almaa Heritage Village in Assir Region Tentative WHS (08/04/2015). 52 km west of Abha, this 900-year-old village with about 60 stone buildings including a museum in a 400-year-old building. Some buildings have as many as 8 floors and all have coloured windows of red, green, white and yellow. The village women decorate the interior walls with colorful inscriptions known as Al-Qatt art. In the courtyards are wooden chairs and coloured mats.
As the 52 km drive here took well over an hour, I decided not to go but include this for information’s sake.
By 7 am, I started the 967 km drive to Riyadh. Across the Empty Quarter, there was no elevation change for the entire time and not many curves in the road, Initially, there were lovely rugged mountains with dunes cascading down the sides on the right and nothing but flat sand on the left. I passed through a largely agricultural area with many fields with center-pivot irrigation, a massive series of grain silos, and trucks carrying bales of hay. Go figure. Only Saudi Arabia would have the ability to waster and fertilize this much blank desert.
I was able to drive at 140-160 km/hour most of the way. But there were still intermittent speed bumps, especially at any town or military checkpoint. I arrived at Al-Kharj, about 125 km south of Riyadh for the night.
Al-Faw Pre-Islamic City in Central Arabia (Qariah) (08/04/2015) was the capital of the first Kindah kingdom. It is located about 100 km south of Wadi ad-Dawasir, and about 700 km southwest of Riyadh. The Al Faw archeological site reveals various features such as residential houses, markets, roads, cemeteries, temples, and water wells.
It is famous among linguists for being the site of the first and only attestation of “Old Arabic”: an inscription in Sabaic script dating to the 1st century CE. The inscription’s language is considered to be a precursor of Arabic, which itself is first attested in the 328 CE Namara inscription in Syria.
Researchers know little about the city. According to archaeological excavations, the city dates to the fourth century BC. The city was originally known per the corpus of inscriptions in the site as Qaryat Dhu Kahl. Kahl was the main deity worshiped by the Arab tribes of Kindah and Madh’hij. It is also known by the names of Qaryat al-Hamraa (Red City) and Dhat al-Jnan (City of Gardens) by the inhabitants in its period of prosperity.
The golden age of the city stretched for nearly eight centuries between the 4th century BC and 4th century AD before it was abandoned. In its long period, the city survived various attacks from neighboring states, as suggested by late 2nd century AD Sabaean accounts. Also, the inscription of Namara mentions the expedition of Imru’ al-Qays ibn ‘Amr into Najran where he reached Qaryat al-Faw and drove the ruling tribe of Madh’hij from the city. It was never mentioned after that incident again, except in a brief account by al-Hamdani.
Archaeological digging revealed that the city developed from a small caravan passing station, into an important commercial, religious, and urban centre in central Arabia, Najd.
Al Faw village is located on the northwestern border of the Empty Quarter, thus, it is located on the trade route that connects the south of the Arabian Peninsula with its north-east. Al Faw was an important trade hub and had more than seventeen water wells.
As of January 1, 2014, the site is completely fenced for protection against looters by the Saudi Government. The site is tended by a Saudi caretaker whose family has ties to the immediate area. The site was authorized and allocated funds for significant improvement, preservation, and the construction of a modern visitors center. Construction was to have been completed by December 2013, however, to date no construction has started. The site is extremely impressive, with multiple Nobelmans and Warrior class tombs spaced along the Eastern periphery. The King’s tomb resides somewhat separated and to the North West of the City. The marketplace shows significant erosion of the walls, which have buried almost an entire story of the once 3 or 4 level artifice. Remnants of grain storage and baking ovens can still be seen today. Located East of the city lies a large jebel, with significant caves and petroglyphs.
Actually in Riyadh Province, this is much closer to Abha, just off the highway.