AlUla is unlike anywhere else in Saudi Arabia. What stays with you isn’t simply its beauty, but its age and the distinct feeling of the passage of time.

The striking sandstone formations, ancient tombs, rock art and unfolding archaeological discoveries tell stories of the land, its animals and its people across thousands of years. And the verdant date palm valleys remind you that people have travelled through, and been nurtured within, this landscape for millennia.

There is a remarkable stillness here that feels almost restorative. Yet AlUla has a contemporary energy too. Extraordinary contemporary art sits within the landscape, sometimes nourishing, sometimes confronting, and often colossal, alongside the little public library in town, with its shelves of Arabic and English books inviting the prospect of an afternoon doing nothing much.

There are moments when that stillness gives way to something rather more exhilarating. Desert Polo brings horses and riders from Saudi Arabia and around the world into the AlUla landscape, an extraordinary setting in which to watch one of the world’s oldest equestrian sports.

Between the Arabian horses, the skyscapes, archaeology, art and endless date palms, AlUla has a way of making the enormity of modern life feel somehow simpler and easier to carry.