Hiking up Jebel Jais
One of the accusations often levelled at Dubai is rather strange: “There is no nature there, everything is artificial”. I have always believed this narrative to be the by-product of some kind of post-colonial envy: As if Arabs had to apologize for using the very natural resources that the colonial superpowers used to steal for themselves for the beautification and development of their own land.
The Hajar Mountains make the point rather bluntly: If you insist on discounting the desert as nature, here is one of the highest mountain ranges in the Arabian Peninsula, rising between northern Oman and the eastern edge of the UAE.
The road up is part of the experience: a slow unwinding of switchbacks, bare stone, widening air and sudden views that make the coast feel both close and impossibly far away. The area near Jebel Jais on the Emirati side is full of amusements: viewing decks, food trucks, good restaurants, the Jais Sledder, billed as the region’s longest toboggan ride, and Jais Flight, which held the official Guinness World Record as the longest single-span zipline for years, stretching 2.93 kilometres across the mountain ravines.
My favourite is the hike to the highest elevation in the UAE, at approximately 1,892 metres above sea level. The summit of Jebel Jais itself is technically in Oman, at 1,934 metres, but there is a strange satisfaction in a hike that leads to the highest point anywhere, even if that point is still lower than Bogotá, the city I lived in for many years, at 2,600 metres above sea level.
The hiking trail is nicely maintained, with clear signage for people prone to getting lost, and it opens onto some of the most beautiful views of the Hajar Mountains and the waters of the Arabian Gulf, not far from the now infamous Strait of Hormuz. It is not a particularly difficult trail and unlike the hike up Lion’s Head in Cape Town, it is quite apt for people with extreme fear of heights. I would still bring good shoes and a light jacket: it can get chilly up there in winter.
Arrive by sunset and the whole canyon seems to redden at once, the light of the arab sun catching the rock until even the most determined sceptic has to concede the point. If this is not enough nature for you, I give up.
Gear Note: All pictures taken with the Nikon Z8 and most except the sixth one (taken with the Nikkor Z 50mm 1.2) with the Nikkor Z 24.70 (Mark I).
