Sand Sledding in Shaybah

Just recently we have been introduced to sand sledding. SAND sledding?

It's very similar to snow sledding, the biggest difference in my mind (aside from the obvious snow/sand difference) would be that walking back up the sand dune is much more difficult than walking back up a snow hill. That being said, I have heard of die-hard sand sledders that take turns driving the kids back up the dune using their 4-WDs. I suppose in the absence of a chair lift one has to be creative, and with gas being cheaper than bottled water here, a sand dune valet is the way to go!

You have to know that the expats living here have excellent work/life balance. Nearly everyone is home by 4:15 and never works a weekend. That leaves a tremendous amount of lot time to pursue hobbies, coaching baseball and finding ways to have fun in the desert. So when I hear men discussing the best brand of sand board wax, I only bat an eye because I had never heard of sand board wax - not because I'm surprised that these guys would go to that extreme.

In November we had the privilege of going with the Cub Scouts to the Shangri-La of sand sledding: Shaybah. Shaybah is an oil producing facility that was made in the 1990's in the middle of the Rub' Al-Khali, the empty quarter of Saudi Arabia. You can look for hundreds of miles in any direction and see nothing but red sand dunes. I think it's similar to the image you see depicted in many paintings of the middle east - very typical desert. Aramco built the roads to Shaybah where they found the oil, using giant bulldozers to move the mountains of sand. Approximately 1,000 men live and work there, although some only during the week. There is now a tiny little town that has a recreation center, dining hall, fire station, grocery store...pretty much everything you need to live there, including an airstrip. There is an interesting view of Shaybah from space here.

Last month the Cub Scouts borrowed (hijacked?) the company 747 and flew down to Shaybah for the day. It was a very unique experience, especially in these days of increased security. The boys got to take turns going into the cockpit with the pilots! My boys don't remember a time when that was common on commercial flights (Jake was 2 days old when 9/11 happened).

Arriving in Shaybah was very surreal. As I mentioned earlier, it's literally in the middle of nowhere. It instantly conjured up images in my mind of wandering for days, unsure of what direction you are going, mirages, crawling around in search of water, and caravans of camels. And as we begin to wander up and over the dunes in search of the perfect sledding hill, we lost sight of the town - or any signs of civilization for matter. It was all sand any direction you faced, and the few shrubs that were around all began to look the same. It was disorienting and uncomfortable to say the least. Is there an official term for the fear of the endless desert? Needless to say I didn't let the kids out of my sight for a minute!

To give you some idea of the vastness of this area, take a look at the picture to the left. You can see Jacob in the foreground on the left, just down the hill from the camera. Now look in the very center of the picture at the dark spot. That spot is Michael, climbing up the next dune! You may have to click on the picture to enlarge it.

There was quite a wide range of sledding equipment, ranging from custom made and waxed wooded sand sleds, to cheap plastic Flying Carpet sleds (remember those...they are thin, long narrow strips that roll up?). Another family was kind enough to lend us a little plastic saucer for Michael and Jacob to use. Quite honestly, the only sleds that went fast enough to make the walk up dune worth it was expensive waxed wooden ones and the flying carpets. The boys gave our plastic saucer a couple runs, and then ended up abandoning them for just plain old running and rolling down the hills.

At the end of the day, we were treated to a buffet dinner at the top of one of the hills overlooking the town. There was all kinds of salads, raw veggie trays, grilled chicken and shrimp, rice, hummus and bread, grilled veggies...and then another whole table of deserts. The perfect end to a very fun day! And after climbing the dunes in the full sun all day, I can assure you that the plane was substantially quieter on the way home!

After being invited go sledding a bit closer to home on Christmas Eve morning and still being sled-less, I'm now on the prowl for a couple of Flying Carpet sleds. After an extensive search of toys stores in Khobar, we still haven't found any sleds - the closest we came was the plastic top of a baby changing table (which we couldn't buy separately). There are a couple of inflatable sleds in our garage that we brought with us from Michigan, but I'm told that they will not work very well in the sand. So more than likely we'll bring some back next summer, packed alongside the deodorant, Johnny's Seasoning salt, butterscotch chips, and printer ink cartridges.

I still have several more of my favorite pictures of our day in the "deep desert" that I didn't really have space for above, so I'll just attached them here at the end for you to enjoy.