To see the rock art, we headed north from Buraydah, through the town of Ha'il to the smaller resort of Jubbah. There are two sites for the rock art: Jabal Umm Siman in Jubbah, where we went, and the slightly more remote Jabal Al-Manjor/Jabal Raat double site. Jubbah is also one of the smaller towns in the northern part of Saudi Arabia. There are a few signs pointing from the main road towards a place with rock paintings, but the end of the road has to be navigated using any of the online or offline maps.

Although the map has pointed us towards the museum and the place with the petroglyphs, on the way we saw another site with something obviously there: there was a staircase attached to the stones, the whole place was fenced off, and workers were just putting up an information board in front of the entrance. A gentleman who appeared to be the head of this shift spoke to us in English, welcomed us and explained that the museum and the main petroglyphs were about a kilometre further down the road, but that we could go and see these if we wanted to. So we did. The stairs led us to a stone with images carved into it. 

We continued towards the museum is probably a bold designation for the administration building for the caretakers who open and close the gates to the main set of rock formations, with paths and sometimes stairs leading between them if the petroglyphs are high up. While there were no exhibits inside, just toilets and empty spaces for various souvenir shops, we did at least find a framed deed of registration and a caretaker with whom we signed the visitors' book. His colleague opened the gate for us and we were free to explore.

The oldest stone images are up to ten thousand years old. They depict animals and people, everyday activities like hunting. Later, domesticated animals like camels or ostriches start to appear. As Zoe pointed out in her review, the pictures also show animals that were hunted to extinction. One of the pictures shows a king in profile, reminiscent of Egyptian hieroglyphics. Later, the Berber-Bedouin people added their descriptions on the rocks in their traditional script. The reason why people settled on this site was that there was once a lake here.

We looked at everything in detail, took pictures and appreciated the fact that we could do so in absolute privacy. As we walked out, a busload of Italian retirees came to see the site. Good timing, we really enjoyed experiencing it on our own.