8 Mar 2009, the second military check point, Oman, 15931km

After Salalah, the way went along the coast and became hilly. It was tough.
There were camels in the desert. Maybe they were owned by someone? I saw them coming from a village in one morning.
I saw a scorpion too once. It was a big one, apparently more than 12cm long from the head to the tail, crossing the road slowly. It was not offensive though I got very close to it to take a picture. But I should be careful when I camped in the desert, not to step on it by mistake.
I heard later from a soldier that there were some poisonous snakes too near the border to Yemen. And "wolf", he said. (Wolves in the tropic? I wondered. Perhaps some other animal.)

I reached to a military check point in the evening. The second one. I had no problem to pass the first one, but had a little problem there. They asked if I had taken permission or some sort to travel to Yemen. I had never heard of such. Then they called to someone above and asked if they could let me go through. We had to wait for the answer for nearly an hour. The sun set meanwhile.
The soldiers were nice though. They cared about me and offered me tea, and dinner as well after they got the permission finally. The food was, chicken, tomate, some other vegitables, everything in chunk, mixed and fried. Omani food, they said. I had a chance to eat real Omani food at last. That was nice.
They let me use shower as well. I camped near the base that night to avoid "tropical wolves".