Last 60 with my 50 – Tabuk

Our adventure in Saudi Arabia is coming to an end and we are already thinking at what soon will be our new home. We have 60 days, to capture how we see KSA after being here for 3 great years. This on-the-road reportage, shot with my 50mm is part of my mini-project before starting a new fantastic adventure!

To reach Tabuk from Jubail you must travel 1600 km to the West and 100 years in the past: Tabuk has not much of the Saudi Arabia that we got used to after living 3 years in the Eastern Province. The footprint of the Oil&Gas industry that dominates the Dhahran area, here can not be perceived.

Farms and mountains are much more frequent than oil fields and skyscrapers: this is a border town a few kilometers from Jordan, mainly known for it’s air-force base, the biggest of all Saudi Arabia. Marta and I pushed ourselves till Tabuk to meet with and to have one last laugh with our friends and cheer and celebrate their coming back to Saudi.

A different Saudi Arabia where many of the workers are locals, road signs are in arabic only and were people has been nice and warm with us, westerner visitors. Tabuk souk is quite ‘rough’: nothing to do with the glimmers of Khobar and much closer to the souk of Jubail. An arch of an undefined style got a bad treatment from some local punk armed with spray can: this did not improve the situation, sand and litter dominate the scene even further where the semi-pedestrian area of the souk develops down into the city.

The next day, breakfast from a local bakery where the oven is a hole in the wall and we decide to hit the road and explore the surroundings. Some 50 km outside Tabuk: that’s where, in the  middle of nowhere, a village has been built around a camel racing course, apparently with the sole scope to breed camels.

Time flies and for us is time to go back to Jubail: just a few more days are left before the Final Exit visa is stamped on our passports and, as there is no Tourist Visa here in KSA, see you soon somewhere around the World!