We are back in Germany – green, rainy, well-organised, toilet paper deprived Germany – oh how we missed you, or did we?! I`ll admit it dealing with the thought that we might not be able to get back was pretty unpleasant, but I can`t say that I felt particularly homesick over the last two weeks and I hope neither did the other fieldtrippers. Letting go of the excursion routine, the great outdoors and the people that surrounded you non-stop is easier said than done. So, to make our transition back into our everyday lifes a bit smoother and to say goodbye to our readers, I am writing one last blog.

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The day has come. In dribs and drabs our newly minted Oman-travellers arrived at the hotel in Muscat. A hotel that conveniently changed its name and 1/4th of its facade over the last couple of months, but otherwise, from staff to breakfast, remained exactly the same. From the standpoint of the arrivals, something else probably changed its facade over the last 24 hours and that is Oman itself. The country went from a blank shape on a map to a real place with character, colours, sounds and smells.

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What was initially intended as an „advertising measure“ to make the Geoverbund better known among students has since developed into a real flagship for the joint geoscientific network of RWTH Aachen University, Bonn University, Cologne University and Forschungszentrum Jülich. There is hardly any other place on Earth where, thanks to the arid climate and the lack of soil coverage, such first class outcrops (this is what the geologist calls places where the rock is visibly exposed) can be observed. Where else can you go for a walk on the so-called „Moho„? A boundary layer that marks the transition from the Earth’s crust to the Earth’s mantle and that usually lies several kilometres deep inside the Earth?

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