The fort is built from local limestone and coral, which were common building materials in Bahrain before modern concrete arrived. Its thick walls kept the inside cool in summer and warm in winter — a clever design for a place with very hot summers. From the towers you can see for a long way across the landscape.
A wadi is a special kind of valley in the Arabian world. For most of the year it looks dry and sandy, but when rain falls it can fill very quickly with rushing water. Bahrain does not get a lot of rain, so a wadi is an interesting and unusual sight. Date palms and other plants grow along the wadi near Riffa Fort, fed by underground water.
The fort was once home to important leaders and their families, and it would have been busy with servants, guards, cooks and visitors. Walking through the rooms today, you can see where people slept, cooked food and kept a lookout. The wind towers — a traditional way of cooling rooms before electricity — are a particularly interesting feature.
Wind towers (called barjeels in Arabic) are tall square chimneys designed to catch the breeze from any direction and funnel cool air down into the rooms below. You can see them on old buildings throughout Bahrain and other Gulf countries. They are a brilliant piece of engineering that needed no power at all.