Travel: Al Fateh Grand Mosque

The Al Fateh Grand Mosque is a major tourist attraction  in Manama, Bahrain. It’s worth checking out for the history, the tour, and the seeing the interior first hand. It’s free, and if you’re not dressed appropriately, then they offer complimentary wardrobes for you to utilizes during your visit.

If you do visit, plan on stopping by the Mosque in the morning, as lines will be shorter. The entrance is along the east side and it can get very hot waiting on the plinth. Okay, let’s check out some photos!

Al Fateh Grand Mosque

First up, our hotel was in the Garden area, so we walked to the mosque. It was about a 10 minute walk, however, most others arrive via bus as they’re part of a tour group. We saw about 35 massive coach busses, at least half were part of a cruise ship that had made port in Manama.

It’s a little chaotic where you enter, through the portal, since they take people in based on language for each tour. We initially ended up with a French tour and had to double back since I don’t understand French enough to make the tour worthwhile.

Once we were set up with an English tour, only about 10 minutes later, we got to enter the prayer room. The chandelier and the mihrab are the most eye catching details in the whole mosque. The mihrab indicates the direction of Mecca, which is the direction during prayer.

After the prayer room we could wander a bit, take photos, and read up on the history of the mosque. All the displays were in Arabic or English, making it accessible for us to read and gain insight.

Overall, it’s worth visiting a mosque if you’re in the Middle East – there are some massively famous ones, however, we wanted to visit one that was a bit more main stream, had been used in the past, and was a realistic representation of an everyday mosque. The Al Fateh Grand Mosque is a highlight of our trip to Manama, Bahrain.

Thanks for stopping by and happy travels – see you again soon.