Mountain Biking Wadi Bih

A while back I got 'forced' by my biking loving hubby into a weekend biking trip to Wadi Bih, described in the UAE Off-Road Guide book as "The UAE's answer to the Grand Canyon"...gulp! 

A rare sight...me and a bicycle!

Wadi Bih has a mountain road that covers approx 75 kilometres, hosting the annual Wadi Bih run and Mountain biking challenge, neither of which are for the faint hearted. 

I hired a ladies mountain bike from Wolfies bike shop on Sheik Zayed road, unfortunately they'd run out of men's hire bikes that weekend so after calling the hotel, we arranged to hire one from there. 

Turned out to be some old local ladies bike, Johan was quite worried when she came wheeling it out to reception but it turned out to be kick ass Hummer. 

We set out Thursday evening to The Golden Tuplip, Dibba where we would be spending the night. The drive from Dubai took about 2.5 hours with Thursday rush hour traffic and you cross the boarder to Oman so you'll need your passports. 

Arriving at about 21:30pm once checked in we just had time for a quick beer before bed. 

Whilst clean, The Golden Tuplip has seen better days. I suppose it was quite cool in a retro 'must have been top notch in the 80's' kind of way. Of course it was totally fine for our one night purpose. 

Indulging in hearty early breakfast the following morning and meeting up with our friends who'd be joining us, off we popped on our mountain adventure. 

All the fresh fish baking in the sun

As you exit The Golden Tulip you briefly cycle the coast road which is really pretty. Generally, sea air often has a fishy waft to it but at one point the pungent aroma was over whelming. We realised this was due to the vast mats of fish laid out to dry in the sun along the road.

 More nature came in the form of some serpentine road kill...I swear I didn't do it!!

With the sun blearing down it sure gets hot so make sure you take plenty of water, we had a brief rest at about 8km then it was time to hit the road again.

Unfortunately after about another 5km I had, had enough.

This was frustrating and I wasn't being wimpy, I wasn't even tried form the cycling I could have gone about another 20km or so easy, I reckon.

No, my problem was of a more delicate nature.....a chaffing issue.

The roads are extremely rocky and bumpy, riding over which causes terrible friction in certain places.

What goes down must come up!!

Mountain biking amateur that I am, I didn't know to procure some of those special cycling shorts with a fake bottom in them or to apply liberal lashings of Vaseline to ones delicate areas to prevent this.


Also, I didn't have any gloves so my hands were red raw and blistered and I just couldn't hold on any longer.

Saddle sore and hobbling I could just about manage the 12 km back...ouch!



And all those hills that had been fun powering down shouting "Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeee" on the way up....weren't so fun on the the return journey!

It was definitely worth it though the scenery was amazing and it feels so liberating cycling along with the wind blowing in your face, it's also great is to get out of the city.

Beautiful mountain views!

Our round trip was a respectable 25km, although our friends carried on and ending up doing about 50km.

I would definitely recommend mountain biking in Wadi Bih as a great weekend trip out of the city.  Regardless of your level of experience biking as you can do as much or little as is you want. Just be sure you remember gloves, fake bum and Vaseline!!

We spent the afternoon lazing on the beach and finally my reward....a well earned beer, nothing quite compares to a cold beer after a day out adventuring.

P.S. The next day I was walking like John Wayne!