When Marianne Roth sets up camp under Oman’s vast desert skies, she places a small photograph on her dashboard — her late husband Reto’s quiet presence accompanying her across dunes, wadis and winding mountain tracks.
At 62, the former Swiss high school librarian is on her third overland journey to Oman, a country she now calls a ‘camping paradise’ and a place where loss has slowly given way to renewal.
“This was always our dream”, she says. “So in a way, he is still travelling with me”.
Roth never planned to become a solo adventurer. For most of her life, she had not even driven a car. That changed abruptly when her husband was diagnosed with cancer.
“The same day, I applied for my learner’s permit”, she recalls. “I had to drive him to hospitals, to treatments. There was no choice”.
He died just over a year later, before retirement — and before the couple could embark on the long journey they had imagined together in a rebuilt Toyota Land Cruiser.
Years later, Marianne decided to honour that dream.
Her first trip to Oman in 2022 was by air, renting a four-wheel-drive vehicle and rooftop tent by Active Overlander. “I fell in love immediately”, she says. “But I knew I had not seen enough”.
A year later, she returned — this time driving from Switzerland in her husband’s old diesel-run Nissan Pathfinder, which she affectionately calls ‘Shotor’ — the Persian word for ‘camel’ — crossing Italy, the Balkans, Türkiye and Iran before taking a ferry to the Gulf.
Now, on her third visit, she moves with quiet confidence across landscapes she knows by heart.
“Oman is special because it has everything”, she says. “Wadis, oases, mountains, canyons, deserts and the sea. But most of all — it is the people”.
She speaks with particular warmth about Omani hospitality.
“They are very traditional and at the same time very tolerant”, she says. “It feels balanced. In Europe, we often think it must be one or the other. Here, it works together”.
From the white flats of Bar Al Hikman to the towering dunes of the Rub Al Khali and the rolling sands of Rimal Al Sharqiya, Marianne has explored Oman’s varied terrain at her own pace.
She counts Masirah Island, Nizwa and the village oasis of Misfat Al Abriyeen among her favourite stops, along with the wild beaches of the south.
Yet it is not just geography that keeps drawing her back.
“I feel very safe here — comfortable and welcome”, she says. “For many Europeans, that is hard to believe”.
Her travels have also become deeply personal.
“I became a very good friend to myself”, she reflects. “Travelling alone teaches you who you are”.
Marianne documents her journeys through a blog, staying connected with family and fellow travellers. But the road itself remains her true companion.
“If I travel by plane, my soul arrives days later”, she says with a smile. “If I travel by car, my whole personality is already there”.
As she looks ahead, Oman remains firmly on her map.
“Self-awareness and freedom”, she says, when asked what keeps calling her back. “That is what I find here”.
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