Province
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The Land Beneath the Land
| The caves of Saudi Arabia are a small window into another world, one filled with exotic animals, majestic vaults and mysterious phenomena. This is the landscape of Aladdin and his magic lamp |
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Al Habkah and Khalegat Al Habkah is a limestone cave system at least 100m deep and 7m wide at its entrance, located about 150km from Ar'ar on the Tapline Road towards Rafha.
The caves are only suitable for expert cavers, but provide extraordinary opportunity for discovering formations such as banded draperies, soda straws, stalactites and helictites.
Cavers from the saudicaves.com website also found what seem to be complex systems of ancient qanats (irrigation canals) nearby, and were taken to a "Munbatah," where a powerful and icy wind was roaring out of a 70cm hole on the side of the depression. "It's just like air conditioning," a local bedu told them, "we come here to sit when the weather is hot."
Evidence of wildlife is also plentiful inside the caves. Dhubbs (spiny-tailed lizards) rush toward their dhubb-holes with a style that manages to combine a dash with a waddle in a most unique manner.
There is plenty of evidence of native wolves living in the caves, as well as bats, doves, scorpions and gonfud (hedgehog).
The Saudi Caves project can be found at: www.saudicaves.com |
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