Bare ochre mountains falling 1,000m straight into the sea, with fishing villages reachable only by boat, dolphins that ride…Bare ochre mountains falling 1,000m straight into the sea, with fishing villages reachable only by boat, dolphins that ride your bow wave in pods of fifty, and reefs at Lima Rock and Ras Musandam with dense soft coral and huge schools. Utterly unlike anywhere else, a fjord landscape with no vegetation at all. Musandam is an Omani enclave separated from the rest of the country by the UAE, controlling the Strait of Hormuz through which a fifth of the world's oil passes. The Shihuh people have lived in these inlets for millennia; the abandoned village of Kumzar speaks its own language, Kumzari, a Persian-Arabic hybrid. Anchorage: Deep sheltered inlets with excellent protection, the 'Norway of Arabia'. Khasab is the port of entry. Hazards: No site-specific hazards noted, brief normally. Meer