Oman In The Seventies

Some time ago I posted a blog about Ibri in Oman in 1979 and a reader has asked me if I have any other photos of Oman from that period.

I have been through a few of my old photo albums and found these snaps taken by me on a vintage Kodak Instamatic camera. Sorry for the poor photo quality (blame the photographer) but they give an idea of what the place was like at that time.

The old road linking Muttrah to Muscat via Riyam was the only way to get to Muscat until the corniche was completed. Photo taken around 1979.
The mobile post office at Medinat Qaboos in 1979/80.
Not 100% sure of the location but could have been Muttrah High Street in 1979.
One of the gates to the walled town of Muscat. The streets were decorated with British and Omani flags in honour of the visit of Queen Elizabeth II to Oman on 28 February 1979.
Muttrah Corniche on the same day in 1979.
Muttrah Corniche looking in the opposite direction. The grey American cars are the motorcade of Sultan Qaboos and Queen Elizabeth.
Salalah in 1976/77.
The British Bank of the Middle East’s Salalah Branch where I worked for two years from 1976-78. Many roads in Salalah were not tarmac at that time.
The main shopping street in Salalah. There was not much to buy so a good place to save money.

I may have some more photos somewhere which I’ll share if I find them.

5 thoughts on “Oman In The Seventies”

  1. Some really interesting old Oman photos on your site. I worked for BBME Beirut in 1975 and BBME Muscat (and Sohar for 6 months) in 1976 and then went up the coast to BBME Khor Fakkan in 1978 and then to HSBC Hong Kong in 1980 for 2 years. The photo of BBME Ibri is great – I remember driving up from BBME Nizwa when that branch was opened. Your comment about Ibri omelettes with thin slices of fiery green chillies and rolled up in Arabic bread brought back memories – best eaten with a cold bottle of 7 Up pop. Salaams. Chris Coade

    1. Hi Chris, I expect you remember we used to catch the number 15 bus from Stubbs Road to Central. You liked to sit at the back above the engine in a thick tweed suit to work up a good sweat. You nicknamed one of our fellow passengers ‘the Whistler’. Hope you are well. David

      1. the “Chong Hom Kok Flyer” was the legendary Stubbs Road bus to Central – the T-junction at the traffic lights at the bottom of the Peak always tested the bus brakes !!! What is you surname? (you might want to email me with that?)
        Salaams

  2. I worked in Oman, between 1978-1994, with my wife having worked at bbme from ‘80-94. ‘78-79 was in Salalah, most memorable time. I wonder if you have photos of the Muscat souk that was demolished.

    1. Hi Neville, we must have overlapped in Salalah since I was there from 76-78 before moving up to Muscat. I’m afraid I don’t have any photos of Muscat souk – in fact I don’t remember having seen a souk in Muscat. Perhaps it was demolished before my time? Of course there are plenty of photos of the more famous Muttrah souk.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Google photo

You are commenting using your Google account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s