Snorkelling

How cold is it?" A moment of extreme wimpyness hits as I peer over the edge of the boat at the green water. 

"Warm," I'm assured, "28 degrees Centigrade on the surface -25 below." This sounds reasonably do-able, but I still hesitate slightly, and I think the guide has finally realised what he's up against.

"We've come to a different place, I changed my mind, not the one with little sharks in it." I am sure this is not true, but it's becoming humiliating so I jump- the water is pleasantly warm. 

Leila really wanted to go diving so we drove forty minutes north of Muscat to catch a boat to the Daymaniyat islands. These are large uninhabited rocks that poke  out of the sea. Sadly there were no beginner dives available, so I decided to go snorkelling. Luckily the genetic disposition towards seasickness did not appear on the hour long boat trip to the islands.

Somehow despite traipsing to some fairly far flung places, I've never been diving/or snorkelling before. In fact I haven't really swum in the sea many places except for many a freezing may/ October day on Holkham beach in the depths of north Norfolk. It was a bit of a culture shock sticking my head under water. There were tonnes of rainbow fish and coral. In the surprise I sank my snorkel and emerged back to the surface coughing and spitting. The guide on the boat offered me a life jacket, couldn't face this so swam purposefully away -with a face full of sea water. 

Half an hour later I had just about managed to get the hang of it. Was drinking a lot less water and one rainbow fish was beginning to look much like the next rainbow fish. Then (slightly to my surprise) I suddenly realised the two large green shapes below me were turtles grazing on something in the coral. They went their separate ways, but I managed to swim with one for a couple of minutes in a large loop round the coral. In the water it looked almost bronze, and must have been about 75cm in diameter. I enjoyed this immensely but got the distinct impression that the turtle might have thought it was about to be eaten.

The boat then returned to collect me carrying a very excited Leila who had seen a leopard shark. After lunch Leila was dropped off on a second dive, and I was deposited in a new area called 'coral garden' (and once again assured there were no sharks in the area.) The coral was beautiful, and bright purple in places there were lots of rainbow fish and not a shark in sight. However on returning to the surface to get my bearings I was surprised to find no boat in sight, and that the beginner divers had vanished. I was ok for a couple of minutes and then I began to get visions of spending years stuck on the rock and being forced to befriend a volleyball and call it Wilson, before reappearing into civilisation looking like Tom Hanks. Fortunately the boat reappeared in (what felt a very long) twenty minutes and it turned out the divers had been taken by the current around the corner into the next bay...

Leila returned with stories of sting rays larger than her and two metre eels. I remain very proud of finding some unusual  purple coral. 

Returning to the boat I soon discovered the pitfalls of my sun cream application. Hopefully by the time I return I will look a little bit skewbald, but for the moment I have three large red patches. We then drove back to Muscat, and after a much needed shower drove two hours into the mountains to a village near Nizwa.

We were staying at an Airbnb, and as per instructions drove to the local bank and waited for the host to meet us. Leila (desperate for the loo) did not appreciate the time it took for him to arrive, or the endless and bumpy off-road he took us down to get to his house. At one point I was convinced that he as taking us into the desert from which we would never emerge (Leila thought at least she could finally go for a wee.) 

Eventually we arrived, to a really beautiful house with garden chairs made out of recycled tyres and pallets. It turned out our host was a professor of architecture at the nearby Nizwa university, and specialised in using recycled products. As Leila dashed to the bathroom - I happily chatted about how I used to make dens out of wooden pallets with my siblings. He explained that he was going to make a den for his children, but was just waiting to get hold of at least 24 pallets- hopefully more. I wondered whether I should send him Thomas Jensen's email address....