Bisya Oasis

I visited this tentative WHS in January 2021 as a day trip from Nizwa. The archaelogical remains of Bisya and Salut are some 30 km away from Bahla Fort which would make for an interesting stop if you were only to focus on the Salut Archaeological Park with a huge newly built museum.

The cultural landscape of Bisya and Salut is situated where Wadi Seyfam and Wadi Bahla converge, which provided the water necessary for irrigation and therefore enabled permanent human settlements. Several archeological remains have been found and most are still being excavated. The best examples are clustered in close proximity to Jabreen Castle, at the clearly marked Salut Archaeological Park. As is the case with similar archaeological sites in Oman, the Salut castle (bottom right photo) and residential buildings (bottom left photo), together with the newly built museum are now fenced off with a security guard on duty at all times. An Italian team was conducting excavations and restoration works at the time of my visit and it was not possible to enter inside the castle remains (here you can find an interesting read on their works). These remains are quite similar in size and layout to the Al Baleed or the Sumhuram Archaeological Remains in Salalah.

After exploring this area, I decided to go round the fenced perimiter by car on a manageable unpaved road till I reached the nearby rocky hill (Jabal Salut) with 2 Bronze Age cairns, towers or beehive tombs (top …