Heading south

Flying to Jizan

I woke at 0230 after 5h30 of sleep that wasn’t very deep.  I tried to doze some more but gave up at 0330, opting to stay up.

At around 0620 I summoned a ride to the airport.  The driver, had trouble locating me at first and it got a little stressful.  Fortunately, I was able to send a photo of my hotel, which helped a lot.

At check-in, the kiosks were not in use and the Saudia humans were extremely disinterested.  Airline staff told me that I could take water airside for both domestic and international flights but signs suggested otherwise.  And I saw some bottles that had been left at the checkpoint.  [Edit:  My travel companion later told me that they allowed him through with it domestically and at the end of my trip, took water through to international departures!]

At the domestic naSmiles lounge, no fresh food was available for breakfast.  There were plenty of plastic-wrapped sandwiches, nuts and drinks though.  All good to stop me from getting hungry.

My Saudia flight left a little ealier than the scheduled time of 0930 for Jizan in the south.  We received a bottle of juice and another one of water.  The masks in the row behind me deployed during the flight and the passengers were re-seated.

About two-thirds of the way through the flight, we seemed quite close to the ground.  Then we appeared to be at high altitude again until descent.  I suspect the high ground may have been the highlands in the Abha area.

Meeting up

My flight landed on time at 1105 and I met up with E, my travel companion for the next three weeks.  He had just landed from Riyadh a few minutes before.  We had only met for a few hours more than a year ago in Budapest but seemed very nice.

While I was confident that we would get along well, it’s worth remembering that friendships and marriages have been tested or even broken during travel.

We had a rental car booked with Enterprise in Jizan on a one-way basis, returning in Abha.  The local company that masqueraded as Enterprise seemed rather inefficient and had to re-key all details of the booking into their system.

In doing that, they didn’t put in the Abha return but we forced the man to hand-write on the agreement that it would be OK.  Our selected return time of 1530 was also not reflected but was rounded back to midday, which coincided with our pick-up time.

No payment or card details were taken at booking or pick-up.  I guess if one had an accident, they would pursue you through the police for compensation for the damage, using your passport details.

Leaving the airport, we realised that the car wasn’t full.  E decided to return to question this but we later realised that in Saudi, one typically returns it at the same gauge level rather than full.

Errands and sightseeing

Our first priority was to get tickets for going to Farasan Island tomorrow.  We had read that tickets are free for foot passengers but not too sure about for cars.

We headed to the port but was redirected to a nearby office building.  We got our return tickets for the both of us and the car.  For a day trip, there is only one set of times available.

With that out of the way, we took a drive to the Dosariyah Fort, an old Ottoman fort before turning up at the Mirada Gold motel around 1400.  We had a large room, lounge and kitchen.

We headed out for an exploration by car in search of dinner.  The souq area was completely dead at that time.  Driving further afield, there was little that seemed open.  Finally, we stumbled on an Indian restaurant.  This was my first real meal today, at 1600 after a 0330 wake-up.

It was an early night for us, retiring around 1900.  The Farasan trip tomorrow requires a very early start, with my alarm set for 0400.