Nothing but sand for hundreds of kilometres. That was the challenge facing Kiwi adventurer John C. Smith.
Setting out from Salalah in southern Oman, John C. Smith was well aware that, should the expedition team of which he was a part be successful in crossing the "Empty Quarter'', he would be the first New Zealander to traverse the biggest sand desert in the world.
Indeed, the area of desert the expedition was taking on was roughly the size of France, Germany and Spain combined.
And so it was that over the course of the following 49 days, Smith and the expedition team led by British explorer Mark Evans and his Omani companions Mohammed Zadjali and Amer al Wahaibi, covered a distance of 1200km across Oman, Saudi Arabia and into Doha, Qatar, finishing on January 27, 2016.
Mission accomplished, as they say.
Smith is no stranger to Oman.
This particular expedition was his 18th visit to the sultanate in 22 years, having first driven to Muscat with Chris, his wife, from Riyadh in Saudi Arabia in 1994.
At the time Chris was teaching at the British International School, and Smith was head of radiation oncology at King Faisal Specialist Hospital, Riyadh.
It was in Riyadh that Smith first met expedition leader Mark Evans.
A shared interest in weekend 4WD trips into the dunes led to bigger things.
Since then, in addition to his own expeditions, John has accompanied Evans on many adventures: to the Canadian Arctic, to Svalbard and kayaking the coastline of Oman (as land support) to name a few.
Furthermore, Smith is involved with Connecting Cultures in Oman (an initiative founded by Evans and now operated under the umbrella of Outward Bound Oman), and he operates a two-week photographic tour to Oman every year or so.
Smith's role on the "Crossing the Empty Quarter'' expedition was diverse and included support vehicle driver, photographer, medic and quartermaster.
The expedition was 18 months in the planning as the objective was no easy feat.
The team aimed to cross the entire region known as Rub' Al Khali, the empty quarter.
This journey had not been repeated since British explorer Bertram Thomas managed it in 1930-31, 85 years ago.
Thomas' success was a global sensation at the time.
"We faithfully followed Thomas' route as best we could, given current political issues [for example Thomas walked through part of Yemen, something we could not do] and the need to negotiate our way through huge sand dunes in the vehicles.
"We had to pick our route very carefully. The vehicles were fully laden with 50 days' food, water [for camels and the team], cans of fuel, hay for camels, and firewood collected along the way. There was room for the driver only,'' Smith says.
Out in the emptiness, Smith recorded encountering a snake, while most nights the team's sleeping bags were visited by foxes and gerbils as they slept under the stars.
There was a daily search for artefacts in the desert sands and Smith found evidence of ancient flint being worked and even an excellent example of an arrowhead dating back 3000-5000 years.
And on the roof of a cave in southern Oman the team found some very early Arabic script which is now being researched.
While they stocked provisions for every meal of the anticipated journey, they need not have bothered.
The region's famed hospitality was to provide many an unexpected meal.
Smith recalls numerous occasions, particularly in southern Oman when local tribes would insist the expedition team stop and join them in a meal of some significance, leading to more than 20 often impromptu social gatherings along the way.
"I will never forget the kindness and generosity of the local tribes. It was not unusual for local Bedouin to appear at sunset and insist on providing us with a meal of goat, sheep or even camel. Sometimes there would be 30-40 locals sitting around the fire, chatting well into the night.
"It wasn't until the 10th or 11th night that we were actually required to cook our own dinner. Occasionally, the same would happen in the middle of the day as well, filling us but hindering our daily progress. When I arrive back in Christchurch, I will almost certainly entertain a vegetarian stretch for some time,'' he said.
"It was impossible to carry sufficient water for the entire journey and we had to rely on wells. We did have many waypoints from Bertram Thomas' 1930 journey but his co-ordinates were made using a sextant and chronometers and were frequently inaccurate.
"Fortunately we had access to a number of modern GPS waypoints. It was always thrilling to successfully locate a well. The water quality varied from near perfect with a slight salty taste to very sulphurous in smell and totally undrinkable. Fortunately, the camels were not quite so fussy.''
The wells proved to be not simply physical waypoints, but also waypoints through history in the knowledge that Bertram Thomas and his team slaked their own thirsts at those same spots 85 years earlier.
It is also a matter of fact that one well near the end of the journey had also been visited by 20th-century travel writer Wilfred Thesiger, of Arabian Sands fame, making even deeper connections through time.
There's another remarkable, historical waypoint in this story as Smith explains: "Bertram Thomas was born in Pil, near Bristol. By coincidence, my great-grandfather was also born in Pil. Both he and Thomas' grandfather were harbour pilots, skippering the cutters that guided boats into the Avon River, an area with huge tidal range. Both his grandfather and my great-grandfather skippered the very same cutter, but at different times.''
The final word goes to expedition leader, Evans: "it has been an incredible journey for us all. It was both physically and psychologically challenging, but I was constantly bolstered by the perseverance and friendship of my two Omani guides and by the good humour and encouragement of our support team, including John C. Smith who came all the way from New Zealand to join the team, and became the first Kiwi to cross the Empty Quarter.''
The territory
The Empty Quarter, Rub' Al Khali, is regarded as one of the world's hottest and driest isolated deserts. It spans an area of 650,000sq km covering the Arabian Peninsula as it stretches across Saudi Arabia, Oman, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. The temperature in the Empty Quarter during summer reach more than 50degC, while dropping well below zero at night in the winter.
