Wadi Damm

Wadi Damm lies in Al Dhahirah near Al Ayn, where the water has cut narrow channels and smooth basins into the pale rock of the wadi bed, filled with clear green water and reached by a walk up from where the track ends. The surroundings are the reason many people are here in the first place: the ridges above Al Ayn carry a line of Bronze Age beehive tombs, drystone towers of the third millennium BC standing on the skyline, part of the Bat, Al Khutm and Al Ayn World Heritage property, and the combination of prehistoric tombs on the ridge and swimming pools in the wadi below makes an unusual day. The area is dry, bare and thinly populated.

What you actually see

• The rock channels - smooth water-carved slots and basins.
• The pools - clear green water for swimming in the upper wadi.
• Beehive tombs - the Bronze Age drystone towers on the ridge above Al Ayn.
• Al Dhahirah landscape - bare mountain and gravel plain.

When to go

October to March; summer here is severe. Avoid the wadi in rain because of flash flooding. Morning light shows the tombs on the ridge best against the sky.

Honest expectations

Access requires four-wheel drive and a walk over rock. There are no facilities. Modest swimming dress is expected. The tombs at Al Ayn are on a separate ridge and reaching them involves a steep climb.

Nearby

Al Ayn tombs are above; Bat lies west and Ibri north.