Are Omani tour guides exceptional?

Have you ever used a tour guide in Muscat, or seen few of them in action?  The last one I noted was local guide in the Grand  Mosque who was really outstanding: engaging, knowledgeable, passionate, modest and with a lot of humor at the same time. He was speaking about Islam and its cultural aspects. Truly outstanding experience. But I have a feeling that he was an exception, hopefully I am wrong.
This reminds me about how much more a destination can offer having a sound pool of outstanding local travel guides. Nonetheless it can also be a great business for the really good ones.
I am sure most of you experienced the travel guide who is great at giving a textbook monotone speech about the attraction and destination, (making it felt that it is the 50th time he/she is doing it..that week), before it rushes on to the next attraction with extended unopened umbrella (usually of a distinct disgusting color) over his/her head.
Well, the news is that the time of such guides is moving to a slow but sure end. There will always be the traveler who prefers this type of canned food experience, slowly moving into a retro feel, to be revived few decades later as a 'cool' or nostalgic thing to do...
Until then, the new trend is the personalized, original, genuine local experience, offered by amateur or pro guides who promise great fun, originality, a non-mainstream perspective. They deliver much more than visual impressions, they put you in action, situations, stir emotions, make you interact with the city/destination. They tell stories of their own offering you a local angle of the place through their lives, but seen from your perspective. A great example of this is vayable.com. A site where tested tourist guides offer unique travel experiences. Unfortunately there is no tour registered from Oman yet, but check out the "Paris by scooter" tour or the "San Francisco's premier food" tour or the "Old Rome walking" tour.  From 3-4 hours to full day experiences you can have most of what you look for.
Let's put aside for the moment the standard offering of most local agents, and guess if there would be demand for things like:

• experiencing the souqs through the eyes of a local merchant's son,
• fishing with locals from say Bandar Khairan village, then cooking the catch with local family,
• tasting the oil exploration life style of the desert along with an interesting introduction into the world of the black gold at its source,
• do a "Local portre's" or "Past and future architecture" photo shooting tour with a local photographer
• morning horse ride or evening football on the beach with locals,
• Spend the afternoon of a bullfight with one of the bull owners from Barka and go through the excitement of the preparations and the fight,
• and so much more...

(royalty free picture from corbis.com)