As family days out go, it must rank among the most macabre. It is Sunday breakfast time in a city in the Gulf, a busy square has been cleared and men, women and children sip cool drinks in the morning sun as they wait for the main event.
There is never much advance notice but those in the know gather just before 9am, the time for public beheadings.
A police van arrives and a prisoner in white robes is dragged from it by eight officers. The executioner is waiting. He is carrying a four-foot curved silver sword.
An execution in Saudi Arabia. So far this year 89 people have been beheaded in public, surpassing the estimated tally of 87 in the whole of 2014
The condemned man is forced to kneel facing Mecca, and the executioner tests his blade by running it lightly across the prisoner’s exposed neck, making him flinch. There is a drain in the ground to collect the blood.