I’m back in one of my favourite places for a few weeks. There is something about Oman that draws me back time and time again, the pace of life, the people, the incredible scenery and the sheer vastness of the country never fail to excite me as I cross the border and we start the extremely long drive to the South.

Currently, I’m spending time in Dhofar.

The Dhofar Governorate is the largest of the eleven Governorates in the Sultanate of Oman in terms of area. It lies in Southern Oman, on the eastern border with Yemen. It is a rather mountainous area that covers 99,300 km (38,300 sq mi) and has a population of 249,729 as of the 2010 census.The largest city, as well as the capital of the Governorate, is Salalah. Historically the region was the chief source of frankincense in the world.

On my first trip here in 2013, the roads were poor outside of Salalah.

A major road building project has been taking place during the subsequent years to upgrade the route from Salalah towards the north of the country through the small villages and coastal communities that lie so far from major towns.

The difference this visit is quite amazing, the road is nearly finished and it is now a far smoother and faster journey, however, as with all road travel in the Middle East, the camel is a road danger.

Our drive down to Dhofar continued through the night. At god o’clock in some remote part of the central plains, we rounded a corner, luckily having just slowed down to look at a flare from a nearby oil-field (this sort of observation is a way of passing time on the 14-hour car journey) and out of the dark a pair of camels came leaping onto the road…screech, slam of brakes, disaster averted, you really don’t want to hit a camel, even in the beast of a Nissan patrol that we are driving. More caution was required for the rest of night!

No photo of the night encounter but here are some camels along the roadside near Hasik.

Down here in Dhofar, cows also roam freely…

The new road, complete with cow, looking for her herd, a bit of a traffic impediment!

Here were the rest of the herd, on the other side of the cow-proof barrier…

I was a little surprised to see a whole herd making their way down the dual-carriageway. From physical evidence left on the ground, it appeared that they had joined at the previous slip road, possibly an easier route than the surrounding terrain…

On the return journey back down the dual carriageway, we then came across a camel herd being marshalled to their destination on the wrong side of the road by the familiar Toyota pickups that every Omani farmer seems to possess…

Then entering the town of Mirbat a herd of goats on the trot through town…

Laid back and typically Omani, life goes on, even if an enormous road has just cut through the grazing grounds. I’ll just remember to look out for herds when I’m driving at night…