Back to Riyadh

After completing the visa renewal it was time to head back to Riyadh.  I was convinced Ghaleb didn’t know the way and made the decision to follow “Felicity’s” instructions.  Actually I’m not convinced Ghaleb knows his way around Riyadh which tended to be confirmed by his passive acceptance of Felicity’s directions.  Well, in reality Felicity told me and I translate them into Arabic for Ghaleb.

We had travelled from Riyadh to Dammam on Highway 40 and so I was slightly surprised that the countryside at the beginning of the journey looked different.  I have a second set of maps on my photo which I took a quick look at.  My suspicions were confirmed and I realised Felicity was using a different route back to Riyadh.  I’ll explain on the following screen dump.

Riyadh is in the bottom left and Dammam in the top right.  We travelled from Riyadh to Dammam on Highway 40, which is the top straight line.  For the return journey Felicity took us SW towards Hofuf (right arrow) and then west to join Highway 40 about 60km short of Riyadh (left arrow).

Without telling Ghaleb, I made the decision to let Felicity calculate the route.  It would also be an opportunity to see a different part of Saudi Arabia.  Highway 10 was very similar to Highway 40 with three lanes in each direction.  The volume of traffic was also about the same.  Ghaleb is actually a good driver and unlike the average Saudi driver he stays within the speed limit.  Perhaps it is because he can’t afford the $300 speeding tickets.  Anyway, we cruised along on the 120kmh speed limit overtaking the slower trucks.  On a couple of occasions we were in the third lane overtaking two trucks passing each other when our car would be blasted and rocked by a Saudi rocketing past us on the verge doing in excess of 180kmh.

At the beginning of the journey the terrain was mostly sand dunes.

This gets somewhat boring.  However around Hofuf we passed through a more interesting area which reminded me slightly of Wadi Rum in southern Jordan.

We then passed through a vast flat plateau which appeared to be an oilfield as the were numerous pipelines snaking across the ground in all directions.  A couple of oil drilling rigs then appeared which leads me to believe they are still drilling of oil in this area.

The whole area appeared to be desolate except there were camels and nomads wandering around.

The only sign of “civilization” was a very small village which we passed midway through the journey. 

These places always look run down and “scruffy”

A little further on we passed the location of the first of two recent fatalities.  Both accidents were on long straight roads and both vehicles appeared to have been struck from behind.  The police had arrived at the scene and appeared to be collecting evidence.  The bodies lay beside the road covered with a blanket with the debris of the accident scattered around them and across the road.  I assume the police were waiting on the ‘expat’ Bangladeshi road cleaners to arrive and do the cleaning up.  The accident appeared to have no effect on the locals who continued to wizz past us at high speed.

One other thing I observed on the trip were the large number of tracked excavators working in series beside the road.  Each appeared to be digging a section of a narrow continuous trench.  There are four in the photo below.

I must have counted approximated 50 of them working beside the road and can only assume they were digging a trench for a new data cable.  Electrical distribution is by pylon so it can’t be for power.  However it did appear to be an very inefficient way of digging a trench between major centres.  I would have though a trenching machine would have been a more efficient option.  But then if you consider the situation from a local perspective it makes some sense.  Labour and fuel are cheap and they have difficulty maintaining equipment.  Better to have one or two excavators inoperative than your only large trenching machine!