Black River hike

Our project is located on an amazing bit of the Saudi Arabian coast, so naturally the coastline, islands and sea are a big part of what we are doing here. A part that often gets overlooked though is the fact that we are also really close to a vast desert area which and what are effectively the foothills for the massive mountain ranges to the north of us.

Akun is the land based adventure activity part of Red Sea Global and they run regular weekly adventures now that the weather is starting to cool down a bit and spending time outside is actually enjoyable.

We went with Akun to a local area called the Black River for an early morning hike with Ala our awesome guide. The landscape here seems very barren and featureless and in many ways, the absolute polar opposite of the landscape in New Zealand or Ireland, which is why I find it mesmerising and just as beautiful, in a strange way.

Black River was about 25 mins drive from the site and once we arrived in darkness we started the scramble up the rocks and through the gulleys and rock formations. As it started to get light we were getting near the top of the range and as the sun started peaking out from behind the mountains to the east we stopped for a while to take it all in. It was such an awesome place and I loved how isolated we felt.

After enjoying the views for a bit longer we started to make our way down again through a different set of valleys and dried up ancient waterways, stopping along the way to see loads of different plants and trees with Ala emplaning what the local tries use them for. After dodging a handful of scorpion and snake nests we scrambled our way back down to the bottom and made our way back to site.

Given how beautiful the coast is, it is easy to forget how cool the mountains and dunes are as well – will definitely make an effort to do more of these as winter goes onRead more