Tribe, earlier this year, we visited the Six Senses Zighy Bay. We hardly knew at the time that this was going to be our last trip before the COVID-19 lockdown. But oh boy, what beautiful memories; they have still kept us going without the feeling of travel-deficiency this year.

Six Senses Zighy Bay is in Oman, right across the Fujairah border in a traditional Omani fishing village of Ziggy. The moment you cross the UAE-Oman border and start driving in the sleepy town of Dibba you are greeted by … Nature! In our case, it was a beautiful blue-winged Indian roller who flew with our car to welcome us. You have to first cross a wadi to reach the Ziggy bay gate. We preferred to leave our car there and hopped in the resort car. After a zig-zag drive up the mountain, you get your first glimpse of dreamy Zighy bay and the beautiful resort on the other side. The views from the top are breathtaking, with cliffs on both sides and the vast sea spread in front of you, in between is the Six Senses Zighy Bay resort, tucked miles away from the urban chaos.

After checking in the main lobby of the resort, we admired the use of local traditional Omani architectural features in the resort buildings. Over the next two days, we saw that every corner of the resort is so well thought of, beautiful, luxurious, and rustic; it is no surprise why so many celebrities love staying here. The recent names would be Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra who celebrated their honeymoon here. So it was our honor that Sustainability Tribe was invited to Six Senses to see firsthand how the resort is championing sustainability.

We were greeted by the General Manager, Aaron McGrath and we received great information about the resort from him. Very interestingly when the resort opened it’s doors in 2008, sustainability was quite a new concept in the Middle East, I started my career in sustainability around the same time and have had my struggles at work because of lack of awareness (which is exactly why I started Sustainability Tribe then). However, at Six Senses Zighy Bay right from the design of the resort up to hospitality services and guest experiences sustainability is well-integrated, at the core of the business, in their ethos; not attached like an after-thought or an update like many hotels and resorts in the region. It also shows how the brand Six Senses have been committed to sustainable hospitality for many years, rightly as they are known internationally.

Watch here our video about Six Senses Zighy Bay,

Our family fell in love with our villa, our home for 2 nights. The beautiful lounge area after opening the large sliding doors connected with the outdoor lounge area next to our private pool. The pool itself is beautifully designed to accommodate a small baby pool and steps, to let you relax and leisurely soak in the beauty around you. Around the swimming pool, there are plenty of shaded sitting areas including a traditional majlis if you wish to have coffee and play cards. The privacy of the guests is perfectly maintained using wooden screens around the private pool as well as the outdoor shower area on the other end of the villa. The roof of the villas is Arabic roofing where date palm branches are used along with the insulation and cement mortar. The exterior wall of the villa is made with stones, because of which design of the resort seamlessly merges with its natural surrounding.

We totally loved our very comfortable and grand bed, when enquired I was very happy to receive detailed information about these sustainable beds; I’m bringing you a short version here. These are natural handmade beds and mattresses certified fairtrade and organic. The main elements are FSC certified pine wood,  soil association certified organic lambswool, organic latex which comes from the world’s only organic certified rubber, organic coir from fairtrade initiative coconuts. Isn’t it a heaven for sustainability lovers?

So much attention to detail is given to design and selecting materials; keeping nature-inspired, rustic Omani but luxurious feel throughout the villa and the resort. Instead of using toxic air fresheners, they burn locally produced resins like frankincense, known as Bukhoor, which also helps to support the local cottage industry. The use of beautiful Omani pottery for lamps, garbage bin, and interior decoration is outstanding. Many interior fixtures like hanging lamps, mirror frames are made from wood makes the interior design timeless. The same goes with landscape design, being a beach resort there is a lot of open spaces for guest to enjoy the beach and various common pools. The paths are shaded and landscaping is minimal keeping useful shaded fruit trees like date palms. The landscape fixtures like lamps, benches, garbage bins are all made from natural wood continuing the theme of traditional Omani design.

The resort boasts a fleet of Nissan Pathfinders which are hybrid technology SUVs (petrol+electric motor) to take the guests around for experiences. However, inside the resort, they have adopted clean transport. There are only electric buggies and bikes. All the guests are provided bikes for each person in the family, so we were thrilled to see 3 bikes parked outside our villa when we arrived! Now, these bikes are not just good for the environment but it takes you quickly on that vacation vibe when you leisurely cycle around with your kids while helping you improve your wellness. Even the housekeeping and staff use cycles with the storage, keeping the air around the resort totally fresh and pollution-free.

During our two night stay, I must say we thoroughly enjoyed every meal. We tried Shua Shack after a sun-soaked afternoon on the beach, a great dinner at Summer House, daily breakfasts, and a dinner at Spice Market, and when we were too lazy to leave our private pool, we even ordered from Zighy Bar. So I was very much intrigued by how Six Senses delivers not just scrumptious but sustainable food?

Six Senses Zighy Bay has carefully kept their carbon footprint lower by adapting sustainable sourcing. In terms of food, they prefer growing their own food, herbs, vegetables, honey, and even cheese! There is a beautiful organic garden in the resort, where they grow around 30 different types of herbs; you can leisurely take a stroll or even learn farm to table cooking. And then they have an off-site organic farm in Dibba, where there is proper farming of vegetables, fruits, cattle farming as well as Oman’s first artisan cheese making facility. During our stay, we visited both the organic garden as well as the farm and even tasted cheese. It’s definitely a great experience if you are traveling there with kids, plus I even got some amazing tips from their head farmer for my organic garden at home. It’s definitely worth an experience when you are enjoying amazing food and special dishes made by their chef based on what food is grown and then you get to see where all the fresh food is coming from. The products which Six Senses don’t grow, source them locally as possible. They even prefer sourcing fresh fish from local Zighy village fishermen.

But sustainable sourcing is not just limited to sustainable materials in the resort and food, they even produce their own drinking water and bottle it on-site. You can imagine how exciting it was for us to take the tour of their back-of-house and witness all their sustainability efforts and state of the art technology used in the resort. So basically, the seawater is converted into potable water by a series of filtration (sand filter in well, etc), RO (reverse osmosis), chlorination, UV filters, and mineral addition. They also produce their sparkling water and thus Six Senses Zighy Bay has eliminated plastic water bottles completely!

Now the interesting part is RO plants always face the issue of brine disposal, which is a concentrate of minerals removed from seawater. But at Six Senses, they have very smartly used brine to create a special salt pool, exactly like the blue lagoons in Iceland! When guests soak in a salt pool, they can also get mineral benefits for their skin or even can float in the pool. Such a fantastic way of reusing waste and nutrients to create a guest experience! However, the saltwater pool is not the only example of minimizing waste at Six Senses Oman.

A total of 85% of waste is recycled at the resort. So many common hospitality wastes are already eliminated with the help of refillable water bottles, refillable toiletries, etc. The resort also has a take-back program with its suppliers, where the resort returns back packaging material like styrofoam and cardboard boxes. Their Sustainability Manager Simone showed me during our back of the house tour that how they even focus on reusing waste.

They have also installed a commercial composting unit to compost all sorts of organic waste including food waste from the restaurants, kitchen, and even animal waste. Average 120 to 200 kg of compost is made every 2 days with the input of 250 kg of organic waste. During our visit to their organic farm, we saw a composting pit even there. All of this compost is then used in the resort landscape and organic garden as well as on the farm.

At the resort, they even have a waste-water treatment plant, which gives them greywater which then used for irrigation. State-of-the-art bioremediation is used for final stage waste-water treatment by using a reed bed for stabilization and sedimentation.

One of the most amazing things I liked about Six Senses Zighy Bay as they are not just committed to environmental sustainability, but also social sustainability. Six Senses brand is known for its sustainability fund, 0.5% of its revenue and 50% of sales from water in F&B outlets go to this fund which is then used for community-related projects. Six Senses Zighy Bay is involved in providing education, infrastructure, and strategic help to the local girl’s school ‘Sakina Bent Al Hussein’ in Dibba. The resort also supported the local hospital in Dibba by building a new radiology unit. The resort is closely associated with Ziggy village and apart from providing employment, they also provide medical aid to the village.

Tribe, excuse me if this Six Senses Zighy Bay review so far might feel like a crash course on sustainable hospitality, however, I am sure, our Tribe definitely enjoys sustainable experiences.

Let me share our Six Senses experiences starting with a beach cleanup. At the resort, you can also opt for underwater cleanup. It’s our family tradition to take part in cleanups during our travels, as we strongly believe in leaving only footprints everywhere we go. So we did a beach cleanup at Ziggy Bay village, right next to the resort one evening and we were joined by Six Senses Sustainability Manager and diving expert. It was such a rewarding and satisfying experience. We got to learn about underwater cleanup as well as local sea life from the diving expert while cleaning up the beach. Diving experts at Six Senses Zighy Bay regularly remove ghost nets left by fishermen and rescue sea creatures that have been caught in them.

Another beautiful activity we did at the resort’s Earth Lab was soap making. It’s been many years since I wanted to try making soap out of natural ingredients. The entire process was so calming, almost therapeutic. First, we selected our essential oils and herbs, and spices to add to the soaps. The selection process was definitely a feast for the sense of smell. Ruhaan made his batch of butterfly and bee soaps and I preferred making heart-shaped soaps. Throughout the soap making workshop, we learned a lot about soap making from Simone, the resort’s sustainability manager. After pouring our soap mixture into molds, we left the molds in the Earth lab for a day. When we went back the saponification was completed and we could wrap our soaps. Did you know that even soaps need curing? So we were asked to cure our handmade soaps for at least 3-4 months before start using them. Soap making is definitely a fun learning experience for us.

If you more into adventure sports or outdoor activities I highly recommend paragliding or hiking, amazing views are guaranteed! We opted for a relaxing family vacation focused on immersing in the surrounding natural beauty. I even woke up early one morning to catch the sunrise and that was definitely one of the most tranquil moments for me at the Six Senses Zighy Bay!

In the villa you feel so tranquil, I even caught up on some reading and meditation whenever Ruhaan was at the kids club. Ruhaan thoroughly enjoyed his time every day at Chaica’s Club and participated in various kids’ activities. We all thoroughly enjoyed our farm trip. The cheese tasting experience was educational for us and it was fun to taste different cheese based on their aging etc.  We took a few cycle rides around the resort and spend a great time at the pool.

Honestly, there is so much to explore and do in this beautiful village-style resort be it for a family or a couple. If you just want to have fun in the water (with your kids), you have your private pool, then resort pool or swim in the sea or soak in the salt pool or on a rainy day like our last day, you could also take a hot bath in the massive bathtub in the villa. Of course, your private pool is temperature-controlled and the friendly staff is at your service for any such requests.

You could also enjoy a treatment in their spa or opt for a wellness program or even enjoy some yoga classes, if wellness is the focus then it’s a perfect place. The food you eat, the air you breathe here is so fresh, you definitely feel rejuvenated after the stay!

Tribe, we have been traveling sustainably for more than 10 years now, we have stayed at totally self-sustained eco-lodges and even certified sustainable properties but Six Senses was the epitome of sustainability and luxury; giving us rich natural, cultural, and wellness experiences. Six Senses Zighy Bay is definitely the most sustainable resort in the Middle East. A role model and successful example of sustainability myth-buster that sustainability is not all boring and frugal it can also be grand, luxurious, and lavish!

Don’t forget to subscribe to Sustainability Tribe, in our upcoming newsletter, Six Senses is giving a special offer to our Tribe!