Elephant Rock (Jabal AlFil)

Out on the open sand north-east of AlUla, a single block of reddish sandstone stands 52 metres high, and from the right angle it is unmistakably an elephant: a massive domed body and a long trunk reaching down to the sand. Wind, rain and blown sand have carved the shape over millions of years, and the likeness is so complete that it has become the best-known natural monument of the whole AlUla region.

The rock belongs to the thick sandstone beds that underlie this part of north-western Arabia. They were laid down roughly 540 to 485 million years ago, in the Cambrian and early Ordovician, and lifted up around 30 million years ago, when the crust was stretched and the Red Sea began to open. Since then erosion has broken the plateau into the scattered towers, arches and mushroom rocks that fill the valleys around AlUla, and Jabal AlFil, "elephant mountain" in Arabic, is the most striking of them because it stands alone on flat ground, with nothing to hide its silhouette.

The rock is at its best at the end of the day. As the sun drops, the sandstone turns from ochre to deep orange and then glows against a darkening sky, and after dark the formation is floodlit. The area around it has been set up as an open-air evening space, with seating sunk into the sand around fire pits and a few food and coffee trucks, so that the view of the rock is the main event of an evening. Climbing the formation is not permitted; the pleasure is in walking round it and watching how the elephant appears and disappears as the angle changes.

Getting there

Jabal AlFil lies about 11 km from the town of AlUla, around 20 minutes by car north-east of the Old Town via Highway 70. AlUla International Airport (ULH) is about 27 km away. There is a free car park, from which a wooden walkway leads to the rock; the site can also be visited as part of organised tours from AlUla.