More from Al Mouj golf club

Well it seems that the people at the Al Mouj golf club have decided to launch yet another new type of membership: The 5 days a week annual membership, rather cunningly named: The annual five day membership, but really it's the 260-day membership... joy.

Ok so here's the deal:

Play on the course in a working week [Saturday – Wednesday]

• 6:30am – 10:00pm
• No Restrictions
• Joining fee waived for anyone who signs up between December 21st 2011 to January 31th 2012

Existing members who would like to change their memberships should contact the Sales and Marketing Manager directly.

Now, the price for a full annual membership (7 days) is RO 1750 (or RO 1575 if you own/live at The Wave), and there has been some grumblings that it's on the high side for what is effectively a 9 hole golf course (yes the other 9 holes are reported to open in "Q2 2012"). The price for this annual 5 day membership is RO 1250 (or RO 1130 if you own/live at The Wave) - and so to the serious golfers amongst you, this maybe a more palatable option for you to consider. Below is a table showing all of the various membership pricing levels for the Annual 5 day membership for you to have a look at.

Click to make this bigger

Much more tomorrow!

le fin.

Introducing the Muscat Mole: Yiti

Recently I have been contacted by an anonymous writer who wanted to know if they could contribute articles to Muscat Mutterings... and here we are! They wanted to be known as the Muscat Mole, which I thought was a fairly fun moniker :)

Hopefully this will become a semi-regular thing! Here is the mole's first story......

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Yiti Golf Course shelved

Strong rumours are being heard that the golf course planned for the Integrated Tourism Complex (ITC) at Yiti have been shelved. The Yiti show complex and offices by the Sarooj bridge, in Muscat, have hoardings around them, looking like demolition is on its way.

Remember back to January 2007, when Sama Dubai announced the following:

“Sama Dubai, the international real estate investment and development arm of Dubai Holding, will exhibit its US $1 billion 'Salam Resort & Spa - Yiti' development at the International Property Exhibition to be held in Muscat, from 16 - 18 January at the Oman International Exhibition Centre.”

This picture shows an artists impression of the hotel and spa, as planned. The site is huge, 3.7 sq km, and an many of you know, lots of ground clearance and works in the wadi have been done, along with construction of the marina area. A large part of the wonderful beach has been lost, along with village buildings.

Muscat Mole hears that development is still planned, with hotels, but no golf course, and no real confirmed news has been made public. Who owns the land now, and are Omran re-planning the development?

Surely what is needed is a development for Yiti to create jobs and houses for the locals and those from Muscat, sustainable businesses and entertainments, all at prices which can be afforded. Let’s hope that this can be done.
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le fin.

The Jebel Sifawy Boutique Hotel & TGI Fridays

The first of five hotels to be opened at the massive 6.2 million square meter development at Sifah, the Jebel Sifawy hotel is now finished, and set to open on Friday. The hotel has 55 rooms and has earned a 4* status and prices are starting at RO 65.000 per night when I just checked their website.

A word of warning though - as nice as the hotel is, they have yet to obtain their liquor license, so if you fancy a drink while relaxing - bring your own for the mean time. I understand that the license application and approval is in the final stages, and so it wont be a problem in the near future. The road is also not very car-friendly - it's possible to drive there in a car, but I'd recommend either using an all-terrain rental car (ie one you dont actually care about), or an actual SUV.

Now, tonight TGI Fridays are having a private launch, but tomorrow, the doors open to the general public.... I recommend their chicken wings :)

Have a good weekend.

le fin.

Royal Opera House - Opening October 14th, 2011

Well, it was in the papers yesterday, and radio adverts are now also playing out: The Royal Oman Opera House is having it's inaugural performance on Friday 14th of October. I've heard some mutterings that there is actually a private showing on Wednesday the 12th, but none of the official marketing is suggesting this, so I guess if there is anything on the 12th, it will be by invitation only.

Tickets, for the Opera, are actually surprisingly reasonably priced, ranging from RO 17 to RO 60 - but currently the website does not actually allow you to purchase the tickets (it pretends that you can, but you actually cant). You have to go to the Box Office, or to the Hyatt or InterCon, with cash - no credit cards (yet).

You can click here for a list of all the performances this year, and their respective ticket prices.

The mall is 2 levels, 6500 square meters and there have been lots of rumors about what exactly will be in the mall - but nothing confirmed yet. If I get any information I'll share it :)

In other news - the Undercover Dragon over at Muscat Confidential has woken up from his nap and is blogging about the Wikileaks cables. Some good reading!

More soon!

le fin.

Muscat Grand Mall - store listing

As promised, here is some more information on Muscat Grand Mall's new stores. There are quite a few and I didn't bother listing out all the smaller stores but have made a list of most of the bigger stores.

So here we go, in no particular order (and of course some things may change):

Carrefour
H&M (Al Shaya)
Index
"Toy Store" (no idea, but perhaps Toy's R Us?)
Books Plus (Apparel Group)
Max (Landmark Group)
Emax (Landmark Group)
The Body Shop (Assarain)
VaVaVoom (Al Shaya)

Mango (Jawad Group)
K Corner
Oman Mobile
Chic Shoes
Charles & Keith (Apparel Group)
Vinici
Bread Talk (Bin Mirza)
Crocs
Ajmal
Lala Rose
Claires (Al Shaya)
Payless Shoes (Al Shaya)
Mothercare (Al Shaya)
ELC (Al Shaya)
4U
Jumbo
Okaidi
Gymboree
Yateem Opticals
Sunglasses Hut
Gulf Greetings
Centre Point
Capital Stores
Nawras
Costa Coffee (Jawad Group)
Clarks
Pinkberry (Al Shaya) (woohoo!)
Magrabi Opticals
Mona Lisa
Inglot
Spring (Apparel Group)
Totem
Nike
Adidas
Diadora
Tips & Toes
Nandos (Bin Mirza)
Finland Eye Centre
Marble Slab Creamery
Caribou Cafe
Gloria Jeans Coffee
Edible 2 Go
Nectar
Lalique
The Pizza Company
Chillis (Bin Lahej group)
Uno Chicago Grill
Dr Nutrition
Champion
Joe Bloggs
Reebok
Mom & Me
Hobby Land
McDonalds
DQ (Jawad Group)
Asmak
Subway
Burger King
City Cinema (3 screens)
Fun City (Landmark Group)

That's quite the selection, and obviously not set in stone, but it clears up the rumour that Al Tayer are not currently leasing units for their brands in the mall, but Al Shaya are. I wonder what the LuLu Mall people have to say about that?

I also heard that perhaps P.F. Changs would be coming to the mall too, but didnt see it confirmed yet.

The Mall is slated to open on October 25th, but from the information I've seen, I think it'll be December or possibly even later than that.

Personally I'm pretty happy Pinkberry is going to be closer to town :) I wonder if H&M will stock men's clothes?

So what do you think?

le fin.

Local bits and pieces.

Well, we're into the last day of voting for the Radio poll, and so far 252 votes have been cast - and if you have not voted yet, please do!

Over on English Girl in Oman's blog, she has recently blogged about a cause I fully support - The Oman Cat-astrophe. They have a Facebook group here, and you can read more about them there or on English Girl in Oman's blog. The group are a stray cat neutering and re-homing imitative and are having a fund-raising book-and other stuff sale at The Dolphin Club on September 13th. If you have items you want to donate for the cause, you can do so by contacting Lesley on 9291 4868 or Chris Barlow on 9504 0189.

Next up, another local Blogger has finally returned from his ridiculously long vacation - Andy in Oman is back from the 'pines and appears to have had quite the trip, worth stopping by his blog to read about it. I'm sure he'll be gloating about it more in the coming days, the voracious blogger that he is.

I was recently googling about Yolanda be Cool in Muscat and came across a fairly witty new local blog, The Camel Dodgers guide to Oman - if you're easily offended dont visit it. If you like a bit of wit, then take a look, the bedwin doesn't like to write a lot, so it wont take long to read his blogs to date!

More on the Muscat Grand Mall now, and as the news was broken yesterday by the Times of Oman, the new cinema there is to be 3 screens, totaling 300 seats, and both 3D and 4D technology. I presume that means 1 4D cinema and 2 3D cinemas. I have to admit I didn't know what 4D was, so I went to Wikipedia to find out. It seems essentially that it is a 3D presentation with additional effects, which are not guaranteed but could range from:

Vibrating seats, strobe lights, air and water sprays and even smells... It also seems not many main-stream movies are given the 4D treatment.... yet, but perhaps it will catch on like 3D has in recent years. Anyway good to know we're getting another cinema in town. more on MGM in the coming days.

le fin.