Jebel Shams — “mountain of the sun” — is the high point of the Al Hajar range and of Oman, at around 3,000 metres. The draw is not the summit, which is a restricted military area, but the rim: the plateau looks straight down into Wadi Ghul, a gorge deep enough to have earned the Grand Canyon comparison and to mostly deserve it.
The best-known walk is the Balcony Walk (W6), which follows a ledge cut into the canyon wall from the abandoned village of As Sab to the deserted settlement of As Sab Bani Khamis. It is a few hours each way, largely level, and exposed enough that it is not for anyone uneasy with heights.
Practicalities
It is genuinely cold up there. Winter nights drop to around freezing and it occasionally snows, which is not what most people expect of Oman. The road is paved most of the way, with a rough final section better suited to four-wheel drive.
Living nearby
Nizwa, the old interior capital, is the regional centre — a real town with a fort, a well-known Friday livestock market and a growing amount of new housing. Al Hamra and Bahla sit closer to the mountain. This is a different market from Muscat: lower prices, larger plots, and a much slower pace.
