Saudi Arabia and Bahrain - Post 1 - The journey through the desert

This weekend we took our first family trip to Bahrain. The time was restful and relaxing, exactly what we wanted. We love taking road trips and were so glad we had the opportunity to drive. To get to Bahrain, we drove through Saudi Arabia, which was an interesting and very pleasant experience. We spent time in Saudi each way and had a great time there. We thought we would beat traffic leaving at 7am on Friday, but because of the Eid holiday, a lot of other people had the same idea too. It was about a 45 minute drive to the Kuwait/Saudi border. The border crossing was busy and hectic, but the boys did great. A very nice Saudi officer shepherded us through the process once he realized we did not speak Arabic. We were thankful because there were several times we really would not have known what to do.

The drive through Saudi was very interesting. The roads were in good shape, and there were many gas stations along the way. Gas was about 1/2 the price of Kuwait, about 25 cents a liter. The scenery was more diverse than we expected. When we first entered Saudi, it was barren desert, and we would occasionally see flocks of black and brown camels. As we got more south, there was much more greenery and oases. It was very beautiful, for a desert.

 

The Arabian Desert

Black camels

We stopped in the city of Dharan, close to the Saudi/Bahrain border, to explore for a few hours. The city was modern, streets were clean, and the traffic was orderly. We drove down to the corniche to look at the water. They had a beautiful boardwalk, lots of playgrounds, and families were out walking. It was a lively place. Afterwards, we went to the mall for lunch and to look at the shops, then continued on to Bahrain.

                                           

Saudi Arabia has always seemed like a big mystery to me. It is a very conservative Islam country, and it is an interesting place for a woman to live, or in my case to travel through. One thing unique to Saudi is that all women, regardless of their religion, wear an abaya. Everyone we talked to while we were here was very friendly. People stopped to talk to us and play with the boys. One shop owner even opened a back room so Caleb could watch TV while we walked around.

This is the causeway connecting Saudi to Bahrain.

The water was a very pretty color blue and there was not a cloud in the sky, it was picture perfect.

The border crossing at the Saudi/Bahrain border was very orderly and much less crowded. There was even a man serving people tea as we waited for passport control.

Manama is a very modern city, with many skyscrapers and resorts. This picture is of one of the three mosques I saw our entire time in Bahrain. I think they look so pretty lit up at night. I say this is one of three, because there are usually a couple of mosques in every neighborhood in Kuwait, and two within a couple of blocks from our home. While in Bahrain, it was nice to get a full night sleep without being woken by the dualing mosques I hear every night. Though Ben did wake up at 4:30 and 5am two of the mornings...

When we got to our hotel, there were lots of people out and about and loud music playing. The hotel catered to families, and our room had a large tiled porch overlooking the pool. 

  

We spent a lot of time early in the morning and in the evening before bed hanging out on the porch while the boys played with their trains and trucks.

We were very thankful for this opportunity to experience Saudi Arabia and take a driving trip. More pictures and posts to come, of what we did during our stay:).