If you turn left out of the mosque, instead of right, the next thing you will meet is your maker. The residents of Al Habala must have got used to it by a process of attrition; those who did not swiftly became ex-residents.
The mosque in Al Habala is built on the very edge of a vertical drop into a rocky valley 300 meters below. Now a sadly dilapidated cleaved-stone building with part of the north wall and most of the roof in tatters, only the mud-plastered mihrab (prayer niche) remains to indicate its former use. Perched at the northern end of a faint track leading from the cable car station, it shows, like most of the rest of this unique site, little sign of preservation.
Al Habala — from an Arabic word for rope — is so named because of the ropes which were needed to reach it before the advent of the cable car. It is built on a series of ledges two thirds of the way up a sheer escarpment about a 90-minute drive south of Abha. The location, purposely chosen for its inaccessibility to marauding Turks and all other enemies, is unique in the Kingdom and one of the country's most intriguing sites. Its isolation — the harsh grandeur of the vast barren valley below, sheer rock walls above and the evidence of cataclysmic splitting of huge slabs of sedimentary rock laced with iron-like veins littered about the site — attests to the fear-fuelled ingenuity of its builders. Evidence of terraced gardens and the still trickling sweet-water springs that nourish the lush growth of trees and bushes, including wild coffee, hint at the complete self sufficiency of the inhabitants.
With agricultural space at a premium, the dead could not be interred in the soil but were instead slipped into crevices, which were sealed with closely packed stones, in the cliff wall. The wall is oriented so that interment allowed the bodies to fulfill Islamic tradition: head toward Makkah.
Al Habala was once occupied by 70 or so inhabitants and the only practical way into the village was down the vertical mountain wall. Cattle as well as the paraphernalia of daily life had to be lowered down on ropes, although there is a long and precipitous track that could have been used in an emergency by the villagers. The rewards were a well protected home and a lush cool garden village nestling in the shade of the mountain for much of the day. The last of the villagers were encouraged to resettle about 25 years ago. The only wild life in evidence today are murders of crows wheeling idly in fast rising thermals and the occasional lizard basking on a rock.
Such is the history and the attraction of this unique site; it is still possible to get a feel for the place if you wander away from the comparatively huge "refreshment and relaxation area."
Access to the village now is via cable car. A restaurant and relaxation area sprawls along the clifftop next to the Ferris wheel and fairground amusements litter the paved and asphalted amusement area. Escape by cable car down to the village and you arrive in another cafe and rest and relaxation area, paved terraces and concrete walkways. From the lower cable station, the village is just not visible.
The only sight of a stone building the majority of visitors see is from walking along a well-defined track to a restored building. Roofed in corrugated iron with a dendritic infestation of plastic pipes, water tanks and some dreadful metal steps resembling a fire escape, a charming waiter serves tea and dates. The "bodily comfort' police seems to be the dominant force in the village now. By turning it into a minor theme park pandering to the sticky drink fraternity, the village and its history — which could so easily have been sensitively restored and marketed as a unique part of the Kingdom's history have been subsumed by insensitive and avaricious commercialism.
Courteous little notices ask the visitor to "Keep the place tidy and not cut the trees." One assumes that because dumping paint cans and broken plastic chairs in the bushes and spray-painting graffiti on the rocks is not specifically banned, those activities are by definition allowed. Quantum theory holds that by observing something, it changes; the truth of modern tourism apparently echoes this. By making the remote and harsh beauty of Al Habala accessible indiscriminately to all-comers, its unique features have been largely destroyed.
To the north and past the tacky tea-house, over steeply shelving tracks covered with loose stones, the mosque stands isolated over its precipice, a stamped dirt forecourt just outside. To the south of the "easement complex" it is possible to access some of the remoter parts of the village. A few of the still-standing stone houses retain their original beams and palm-frond roofs, some even partially covered with slabs of rock and shale filler. There the sense of peace, isolation and that special feeling of safely "being" that comes from standing on high promontories with huge hazy vistas rolling into the blue distance hangs in the cool air. It is a frequent complaint of people who live in particularly lovely or historical tourist destinations that for them it is home, not a museum.
Al Habala had no residents; the village was empty, the opportunity to restore it to its original state was once available. Now it is an opportunity lost for ever.
