We woke up around 03:00, with a strong wind blowing one side of the tent in.  Fortunately we had plenty of space left in the tent.  We tried in vain to get back to sleep, and Justin got up around 04:15, when it started to get light.  Whilst Crystal read in the tent, Justin grabbed his cameras and re-did yesterday’s excursion, walking down towards the infinity pool.  It was very nice outside, and no one was around except for cicadas, lizards, and crabs - even the goats were asleep.  It was very windy at the infinity pool, but not too bad elsewhere on the trail.  There was some good lighting on the walk back, and he returned to camp around 06:00, right after Adham and Abdullah had woken up.

Breakfast was bread (in the form of a large tortilla-type shape and thickness) with various spreads for the bread, plus coffee and tea.  After breakfast we packed up, then waited as the tent was taken down.  Adham told us that the campsite is rented from the local village, so they benefit from having people stay there, giving a sort of symbiotic relationship.  We were all set around 07:15, and took a different road out, way steeper than the day before.  We stopped a couple times, first for Adham to show us some Frankincense and bottle trees up close.  We later stopped when we passed by some camels, which Adham told us have only one hump.  He also mentioned that in the UAE, a good camel is worth more than a Ferrari.

As we continued driving, it was more like sliding than driving downhill.  At one point we saw a camel with bound feet; it could walk just fine but couldn’t run, so it can’t travel as far in one day and get too far away from home.  Once back on the paved road, we drove south for a bit, and then even further south off road.  It was desolate even by Socotra standards.  Adham said we were going to Wadi Killisan, a natural pool.  It seemed to us that we were a long way from any water.  When we got to the end of the road, we could see the south coast and the Indian Ocean.  [The north coast is on the Arabian Sea.]  In the distance we could see a nice looking beach and turquoise water.

We parked in the middle of nowhere.  We walked downhill through scrub for about 30 minutes and ended up at the bottom of a valley.  At the bottom there was white limestone everywhere.  We couldn’t tell how deep the water was, and if this was going to be a repeat of the infinity pool that was more of a big puddle.  Once by the water, all the driving and hiking seemed worth the trouble.  We saw a couple other people, but that’s it.  We swam for maybe 30-40 minutes, stopping often.  The water had a nice temperature, and there was a waterfall at the east end, more of a rapid actually.

After getting out, it looked like two goats might jump in, but they never did.  Our fast-drying towels worked extremely well, to the point we couldn’t glide it along the skin because it was taking up all the water almost instantaneously.  We took some photos of the area, then headed back up the way we came.  We knew that it was going to be tough given how far we’d walked downhill, and sure enough it sucked, but it was the price of admission.

On the drive out of Wadi Killisan, Adham told us that we’d be visiting Arher Beach tonight and Hoq Cave tomorrow morning.  Then we’d spend 2 nights at Diksam Plateau in the center of the island and 2 nights at Detwah Lagoon in the far northwest of the island.  We didn’t recall ever seeing a detailed itinerary, but then Crystal remembered Julian put it in our Google Doc, and Justin checked - sure enough it was there.  We stopped briefly at a village where a couple of the village youngsters had an iguana to show us.  They had it on a stick, and we passed it around inside the vehicle, then gave it back to them.  Abdullah paid them a small amount, and then continued on.  We got the impression this was a common occurrence, and wasn’t hurting anyone (well, except maybe the iguana, but it seemed healthy).  

We drove north to a Wadi on a the coast, full of date palms, for lunch.  We checked where we were on Google Maps - we’d downloaded offline maps for everywhere we were going prior to leaving California - and the name of the place was simply “Picnic spot.”  There were a decent amount of people there, so for some privacy Abdullah drove through waist-deep water to cross to an uninhabited area, which was pretty cool.  The goats were very interested in us and our food.  They eat damn near everything, including cardboard and paper; Adham told us they’ve been known to eat passports, so we needed to keep them well-packed, otherwise we might get stuck in Socotra.  Since we’d woken up so early, we tried to get some rest, but it was difficult with the goats so close.  Some other people showed up and stopped in the same spot, and we hoped the goats would adjust their attention.

After lunch, we drove east on the north coast.  There were gorgeous beaches everywhere.  Adham pointed out the spot way up the hillside where we’d been the evening before in Homhil.  It almost - almost - looked easier to walk up the hillside than to drive through the middle of nowhere.  At Arher we saw its massive dunes for which it is famous, and Adham told us that we’d come back closer to sunset.  We continued east to Ras Erissel, the far eastern spot of the island, where the Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean meet.  Our attention was distracted from that, however, by a massive puffer fish graveyard - there must have been hundreds if not thousands.  It looked like Omaha Beach.  Adham said they were the victims of increased water temperatures.  From Ras Erissel we could see back towards Arher, and could make out the scale of the dunes [we camped at the base the second dune from the left in this photo].

After getting back in the truck we went back to Arher.  It was pretty crowded, relatively speaking, with some of the large groups of Russians we’d seen at the airport the day before.  We were on the west side of a natural stream (bottom left in this photo), and the only ones over there.  As the sun was going down, we started climbing the dune above us, which we're pretty sure was the tallest of the bunch.  It was incredibly hard work, as with every step we were constantly falling in deeper.  Crystal stopped about halfway up the dune.  Justin continued, 20-30 steps at a time, huffing and puffing after every round, and thinking to himself he had to finish so as to “have done something worthwhile in this stupid life.”  All told, it took about an hour to reach the top, and the payoff was worth it.  There were great views everywhere, up and down the coast.  Adham said the dune is probably 250-300 meters high, so about 800-1000 feet up.

The walk down was a million times easier, and Justin was absolutely exhausted by the time he was back down at the bottom.  We went over to the small stream and went in, Justin soaking basically his entire body to get rid of all the sweat.  Back at our campsite, we ate popcorn (Justin) and shrimp chips (Crystal).  We also drank a boatload of water.  Justin was basically done, his body was shutting down, and so he went to sleep just after 18:00.  Tonight we were in the small tent, which would theoretically do better in high winds, but was also much hotter because the hot air had nowhere to go.  Crystal also nodded off, but woke up for dinner - Adham had caught some fish, and she felt guilty not eating.  But she went to sleep right after dinner.  A little later, she opened the front of the tent and sat with her face right by the doorway, nauseated, but thankfully never had to puke out the front.  When it got windy - real windy - a little later, she closed the mesh door and tried to get some sleep.