Two hours run east of the Persian Gulf coast, the town of Dibba faced the Indian Ocean, sweltering under the lee of the haze-shrouded Musandam escarpment. The Musandam Peninsula and the corresponding coastline of Iran form the bottleneck where the Arabian Gulf squeezes through the Straits of Hormuz.

Adrenalin levels surged as we bowled along Dibba's waterfront. Would we be turned back at the Omani border, just beyond the town ?

Musandam forms an isolated enclave, separated from the rest of the Sultan's domains by the UAE's Emirate of Fujairah on the Indian Ocean coast. At the large, blue sign welcoming us in both English and Arabic to the Sultanate of Oman the extravagant six-lane esplanade narrowed abruptly to a no-nonsense two lanes - but there was no checkpoint or barrier to block our run up to the mountains.