Not common I agree but early seventies Bell 212/205's were often seen in the ME on fixed floats.
I think there are some photo's from the old Skyweaver site now on Photobucket particularly one of 'EE' outside the Bristow hangar in Dubai, also Gulf Helicopters used to operate a couple of 205's on Fixed floats out of Doha circa 1977, was bit of a bugger checking the T/R!!
S