When you visit world-famous attractions, you can usually always tell when you’re close. The clue is not the scent of history wafting on the breeze, but the shouts of sellers of tourist tat, the walls of backpacks and selfie sticks blocking your view. But Hegra in AlUla is different.
I’m at Saudi Arabia’s first UNESCO World Heritage Site, Hegra, and it’s reverently silent. (There are now six other UNESCO sites and counting – go Saudi on the cultural front.) It’s almost spookily empty, which is fitting for a place with more than a hundred well-preserved tombs. As the area as well as the country only recently opened up to tourists, you have the rare opportunity to come face-to-face with history and walk in a path that’s rarely been trodden.
Meet the locals at Hegra in AlUla
Our tour guide, Amal Aljahani, is a local and she has seen the area’s image change, from a no-go area that was once considered cursed to a national treasure that is part of Saudi Vision 2030. The regeneration project is working with such locals to create jobs and boost tourism, which means visitors like me get off-the-cuff insights.
“We used to play here as kids and run around the tombs,” Amal says and you can see the smile in her eyes through her niqab. Imagine Petra, which this shares similarities with, being your playground.
The tour guides prefer the term storyteller and AlUla – along with the kingdom itself – certainly has a lot of untold stories, which visitors are starting to hear. For that reason, so many of Saudi Arabia’s landmarks haven’t made it onto the everyday traveller’s bucket list – yet.
Motoring around history
What makes Hegra in AlUla standout is that it has the historical trivia to match the likes of the Pyramids of Giza, but visitor numbers that make you feel like you’re on an exclusive tour with the most extreme social distancing in place. That means some epic solo shots, which make you look like you’re starring in your own adventure movie.
Hegra is essentially a gigantic open-air museum. As I get whizzed around in a vintage Land Rover, from one impressive tomb to another, I feel like I’m in an Indiana Jones film. Visitors, start your engines, as your transport of choice can vary, from private cars to group buses. From November, Hegra goes millennial and introduces e-bikes.
Be prepared: it gets dusty. You’ll get sand in your hair, shoes and mouth. While it can get hot – you are slap bang in the middle of the desert – the tombs offer a respite from the heat.
Face-to-face with rocking rock art
While tomb-hopping might not sound like fun, there are some thrilling insights into a civilisation dating back to the first century BCE. The region was originally a trade route for pilgrims heading towards Makkah, and shows signs of Nabataean civilisation.
Even if you’re not one for ruins, these rocks, well, rock. Girl’s mountain shows that women were wealthy enough to build their own tombs and some of them are large enough to hold 30 family members. Face Rock – a rock that looks like the profile of a face – is one for the gram. Stand just so and it will look like your locking lips with a sculpture. Take that, Sphinx.
When the tour ends and the sunsets on the show-stopping Qasr Al Farid, which is more than 22 metres high and built for the once-prominent for Lihyan son of Kuza, it’s a sight to behold.
While you may want to save your riyals for a trip abroad, don’t dismiss a staycation at Al Ula and a tour of Hegra. You’ll feel like you are in another country – in fact, AlUla is the size of Belgium and its heritage sights are what make it the jewel in Saudi Arabia’s crown.
So when I now think of UNESCO World Heritage Sites, it’s not just A-listers, from the Great Wall of China to The Tower of London, which will come to mind, but the wonder that is Hegra in AlUla.
Hegra: a star-studded destination, which will make you feel like a VIP.
Discover more about visiting Hegra at experiencealula.com
