OMAN

As we arrive at the divine Alila Jabal Akhdar, we are greeted with plump dates and Omani coffee, another local custom I have quickly grown to love.

The car swings around yet another hairpin bend and the world drops away on one side revealing a deep chasm in the Earth’s surface. I am torn between squeezing my eyes shut to allay the squeamishness I am feeling about the perilous height, and pressing my nose up against the glass of the car door to get a better look.

We have been climbing and switching back on ourselves and navigating whiplash-inducing hairpin bends for some time now, my knuckles turning whiter with each burst of the accelerator. Given our intended destination is some 2000 metres above sea level, it’s probably not surprising that the journey takes a while. I know it’s just my imagination (and the fact that I am constantly looking up so that I don’t have to see how far down it is), but