Theme Week Saudi Arabia – Hofuf
Wednesday, 26 April 2017 - 12:00 pm (CET/MEZ) Berlin | Author/Destination: Gulf States / Golfstaaten General
Reading Time: 4 minutes
Al Hasa Oasis © Shijan Kaakkara/cc-by-sa-3.0
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Al-Hofuf is the major urban center in the
Al-Ahsa Oasis in the
Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. It is also very well known for being one of the largest date producers in the world, and for its old souks and palaces. Historically, Hofuf made textiles out of wool, silk, and cotton. The town was also renowned for its fruit of the date palm, the Arabs considering the
khalasi variety of dates, grown in Hofuf, as also the
fardh variety of
Oman , among the best. As of 1920, the city was known for making coffee pots from silver and brass.
Legend places Hofuf as the burial place of Laila and Majnoon , the star-crossed pair of the most popular love story in the Arab and Muslim world. The Queen of Sheba is also fabled to have visited this city from her kingdom in Yemen .
Fortress Qasr Sahoud © flickr.com - Peter Dowley/cc-by-2.0
The city proper has a population of about 660,000 and is part of a larger populated oasis area of towns and villages of over 1,000,000. It is located inland, southwest of
Abqaiq and the
Dhahran –
Dammam –
Al-Khobar metropolitan area on the road south to
Haradh . It is the closest city to the famous
Ghawar oil field, one of the world’s largest conventional (land-based) fields. Hofuf is one of the major cultural centers in Saudi Arabia. A lot of well-known families live there. The faculties of agriculture, veterinary medicine and animal resources for
King Faisal University are located in the city (the others being in Dammam). The Hofuf campus also has facilities where Saudi women can study medicine, dentistry and home economics.
Although the city has two airports, it is served by
King Fahd International Airport which is 130 km away in Dammam. Of the local airports, the old one is abandoned, and the new one,
Al-Ahsa International Airport , is being used for domestic and limited international flight to
Doha and
Dubai . The city has a railway station connecting the city with the capital Riyadh to the west and Dammam to the north. All railways in Saudi Arabia are organized by the
Saudi Railways Organization .
Here you can find the complete
Overview of all Theme Weeks .
Read more on
SaudiTourism.sa – Al-Ahsa Oasis and
Wikipedia Hofuf . Learn more about the
use of photos . To inform you about latest news most of the city, town or tourism websites offer a newsletter service and/or operate Facebook pages/Twitter accounts. In addition more and more destinations, tourist organizations and cultural institutions offer Apps for your Smart Phone or Tablet, to provide you with a mobile tourist guide (
Smart Traveler App by U.S. Department of State -
Weather report by weather.com -
Global Passport Power Rank -
Travel Risk Map -
Democracy Index -
GDP according to IMF, UN, and World Bank -
Global Competitiveness Report -
Corruption Perceptions Index -
Press Freedom Index -
World Justice Project - Rule of Law Index -
UN Human Development Index -
Global Peace Index -
Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Index ). If you have a suggestion, critique, review or comment to this blog entry, we are looking forward to receive your e-mail at
comment@wingsch.net . Please name the headline of the blog post to which your e-mail refers to in the subject line.
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