Hello, all. I have just spent almost three months backpacking around Saudi Arabia. While I do agree with the point about officials not understanding how to interpret passports (I can't tell you how many times my old Mauritania visa from 2017 has been mistaken for my passport page), I would say that many parts of the country are ready for tourists, or at least are trying their darndest to be.

Al Ula is the best example. They have completely renovated and organized the place to cater to tourists. There are visitor's centers. If you don't have a private tour organized you must book one of the goverment-operated group tours; unfortunately this informaton was not even available at their official website, and I ended up having to wait days for a tour of Hegra as they were all booked (this was Christmas Day). So there's something that's not entirely "ready for tourists" and should be improved upon.

Unfortunatly I was unable to visit many museums, as several cities are doing a complete overhaul of their regional museums and are therefore currently closed. This was the case when I visited Tabuk, Tayma, Al Ula, Hail, and Jeddah (the House Museum, not the National Museum).

Jeddah and Riyadh and also trying their best to cater to tourists. I saw many groups of Western tourists with local guides walking around these cities. They have workshops and events geared towards tourists and liberal young Saudis. They had traditional dancing in front of the famous Nassif House in Jeddah when I was there.

There is a lot of information about Jeddah's historic El Balad neighborhood and there are colorful tourists maps available, and several rennovation projects are underway.

There is also an official government website, visitsaudi.com, which is chalk-full of tourists information (though not much practical information, hotels, transportation, etc.).

Another thing I'd like to mention is that Saudi has a really big camping culture. It's practically the national passtime. This means that, unlike every other country I've ever been to, you are basically free to camp anywhere you like that isn't private property, and it's seen as completely normal by Saudi standards. I just spent a week camping along the southern Red Sea coast, no problems at all, lots of facilities (showers, toilets, huts you can camp underneath for free).

In short, I would say KSA is much more accomodating to tourists than many countries I've been to, and the people here are some of the nicest and most generous I've ever encountered. They should definitely meet their 2030 goal of increasing tourism. The country is very much used to foreigners (foreign workers), just not foreign tourists.