Finally, THE BEACH

We have gone to the beach twice now, and lamely, I still haven't told you about it. It's really very beautiful - the water is bathwater temperature and a gorgeous blue color, the sand is soft, there is a nice breeze. In addition, there are very few people where we were, it was clean, and there was lots of shells that were very different than the ones the boys find in North America. It was peaceful, quiet, simply beautiful. We loved it. I don't feel that I can do it justice with words. But you have to know how privileged we feel to be living so close to such a cool thing to do with the kids, so I'll try my best...

Locally there are two beaches that we can use: the Aramco public beach which is open to all Aramco employees and their dependents, and the Yacht Club beach. Both of these beaches are on Half Moon Bay. While I do not have to wear anabaya at either beach, I am told that the public beach is overrun by Saudis in their abayas . Not only is it very crowded, but I most likely feel uncomfortable, even in my one-piece suit there. To use the Yacht Club beach, one must own a boat or be escorted in by a member. In addition to being less populated and less conservative, the Y.C. beach also has very nice covered picnic areas with clean grills, electricity, and trash cans. You are allowed to camp there and the snack bar, bathrooms and showers are very close by.

Matt has a sailboat and graciously invited us and the Wilkes to come along with his family to the Y.C. beach. We were ecstatic - the kids have been begging us to go to the beach since the moment we stepped off the plane. However, the temperatures have been too high - who wants to go to the beach when it's 110F or more? It's been slowly dropping the last couple weeks and we are now hovering around highs of 100F.

We eagerly packed up a huge cooler of food, grabbed all our beach toys and other gear, and drove in a caravan the 20 minutes to the gated beach. The drive itself was very interesting - I wish I had taken a picture or two. We mostly saw nothing but desert, but a different looking desert than anything I've seen before.

Here is a picture of us getting ready - sunscreen, goggles, etc. Goggles - at the beach?? I know, sounds weird, huh? The water here has a much higher salt content than any ocean beach we've been to in the States. The saltiest water on earth is in the Dead Sea, followed only by the Persian Gulf, due to the high rate of water evaporation in the area. If water gets into the kids' eyes, they start crying right away. Michael says it's worse than sunscreen. In fact, at one point during the day we couldn't find Jake's goggles and he refused to go in the water, even a little, for fear he'd get water in his eyes. There are showers in the sand between the water and the picnic area - for getting that nasty water off your skin immediately!


One more thing about the water - it was so clear that you could see quick little fish, about 6 inches long.


We played here until the sun went down. What a memorable sight! If I had spent more time reading the manual of my new camera, I would have been able to show you a better picture - it looked way nicer than this. Sorry!


We went back to the Gulf 2 weeks later - though not locally this time. There is another Aramco family compound (there are actually six or seven) in Saudi Arabia in a smaller city called Ras Tanura. They have off-shore rigs in this area, and the compound is located right on the water - some of the homes have views of the gulf. You can even go out the back gates onto the beach. The only thing preventing me from being completely green with envy is that they have much higher humidity there, for a much longer time than us. Ras Tanura is about 45 minutes away and the beach on the compound is open to any Aramco employee.

We spent the morning there with some new friends of ours that also have two boys. This time we got up early and had breakfast (as well as lunch later) at the dining hall on theRas Tanura compound - located steps from the beach.


The water here was even more stunning than Half Moon Bay. The color reminded me of the water in Thailand. I'm not sure if it was the time of day, or simply that we were not in a bay. However,because it was not in a bay there was a bit of a tide, and the water was not clear at all in the shallow area of it. In fact, it was so cloudy you couldn't see your legs. Seaweed kept washing up around our calves, causing many memorable moments of utter terror.

There's really not much more to add, so I will just end with some pictures of the boys playing. They went on a couple of adventures along the coast, exploring the interesting vegetation. We are coming into a couple months of great beach weather and anticipate many more weekends in the sand.