Bahrain by car

Peter managed to get his Saudi driving license just a few days before the Eid holiday; this could only be done after obtaining his iqama (residential permit). The driving license means that we will now be able to buy a car, which is something that we will look into more seriously in the new year. In the meantime we've still been having to drive a rental car. Taking the rental car overseas required some additional paperwork - an authorisation letter from the Department of Transport - but fortunately this was approved on the last work day before Eid and so we were able to finalise our holiday plans!

Liam and Owen wrote a few journal notes about our holiday travels as we continued from Dammam to the island country of Bahrain:

9 Dec - Liam

Tuesday

On Tuesday We Joved on a Shota Jive ovr The Woota it Was Butefol.

9 Dec - Owen

The drive to barain was amaizing though short. Across a giant brige, called The Casway with customs in the midle and we were there [in Bahrain].

[King Fahd Causeway is a spectacular 25km causeway across the Arabian Gulf, from Al Khobar in Saudi Arabia to Bahrain. The customs checkpoints are on an island in between.]

10 to 12 Dec - Owen

It's [Bahrain's] hilight was the fort, and its unsigned museum which security guided us to later. A hilight for mum might of been the new way she learnt to tie her skarf. We also found a church which was amazing. It had most of its population being children!

[The famous fort in Bahrain is Qal'at al-Bahrain, which has a 16th century Portuguese fort that has been extensively restored. The site turns out to have been occupied by several different civilizations since around 2800BC and so there have been major excavations near the fort. The brand new museum for Qal'at al-Bahrain is excellent (although inadequately publicized), and left us in no doubt as to why the location has been registered as a UNESCO world heritage site.]