Jebel Hafeet: Al Ain’s mountain of calm, family ties and ancient heritage
As you climb the winding road up Jebel Hafeet, the first change is the temperature. The air through the car window turns cooler, the city behind you fades, and the noise disappears. By the time the road tightens into curves, your focus shifts from driving to the expanding view.
The route stretches 11.7 kilometres and twists through 60 bends, each revealing a broader panorama of Al Ain and the desert beyond. For many residents, this is not just a tourist site but a familiar retreat — a place to go with friends, family or alone to unwind.
A drive that soothes
Fatima Zahrah Seedat, 23, says the journey up is part of the attraction. “There is something about the drive up the mountain, feeling the temperature drop as you drive higher,” she said. She spoke of leaving the city’s clamour behind and arriving at a spot that offers “a rare kind of peace.” At the summit, she said, the reward is “the most breathtaking view of the whole city, especially at night.”
Rising to 1,240 metres, Jebel Hafeet is Abu Dhabi’s highest peak and the second highest in the UAE after Jebel Jais. It lies on the emirate’s southern edge, near the border with Oman and the green city of Al Ain. From Abu Dhabi, the journey follows the E22.
Childhood memories and new traditions
For Mohamad Walid Haidar, 20, the mountain has always been a destination. Growing up in Sharjah, he would travel to Al Ain regularly to meet family friends there. “Jebel Hafeet has always been a go-to spot for family trips,” he said. It is also where he stayed awake all night to watch his first sunrise — a memory he counts among his best from childhood. Now that he drives, Walid has been up the mountain “more times than I can count,” and it remains his favourite place to spend time with friends in Al Ain. He no longer rides in the back seat; he is the one at the wheel.
Fatima’s family had a winter routine: they packed camping chairs, karak, a football, games and blankets, drove to the top and settled in. They talked, played and looked out over the lights below. What stayed with her was not only the scenery, she said. “I remember enjoying being in their presence at that moment in time.” The mountain was the setting, but the memory is about the people.
Different hours on the mountain bring different moods, she added. Hers is the golden hour: “Personally nothing beats a good sunset drive up the mountain.” As the light fades, the view over Al Ain turns into a carpet of lights, and the air cools further.
An ancient gathering place
The mountain’s appeal is far older than the asphalt road. Archaeologists have found more than 500 tombs, around 5,000 years old, that mark the beginning of the Bronze Age in the UAE. People have been drawn to this ridge for millennia, and today’s rituals — however modern with karak and camping chairs — continue a much older tradition of gathering here.
Al Ain itself rewards a longer stay. The city’s UNESCO-listed oasis is still watered by traditional falaj irrigation systems, which have nourished its date palms for centuries. Visitors who want more activity can hike or mountain bike around the desert park, and tourism operators describe Bedouin-style camping under Al Ain’s night skies.
Wildlife and natural treasures
The mountain also hosts remarkable wildlife. Jabal Hafeet National Park shelters some of the UAE’s rarest plants, including the Dwarf Palm, which is found nowhere else in Abu Dhabi or the wider Arabian Peninsula. Its animals include the Arabian Tahr, Blandford’s Fox and Brandt’s Hedgehog, along with the UAE’s only concentration of the globally threatened Egyptian Vulture. The Arabian Caracal has also been sighted here for the first time in 35 years, according to the Environment Agency – Abu Dhabi (EAD).
