Dubai …

A quick Foreword: I bloody hate the photo thing on blogger so you peeps can just deal with the random placing of the photos

I was really looking forward to Dubai I have been here once before in 2005/06 with the ex. So I knew what to expect and after the saga that was Singapore I was hoping that this would be a relaxing 2 days. I arrived in the late afternoon and stayed in the Ibis City Centre not sure if it is in fact the city centre or just a name. However the mall across the road also had City Centre in its name so it must have been.

I spend sometime in the mall mostly looking for international plugs as I decided against bringing the set I have in NZ with me and the hotel in Singapore had international plugs installed as their normal sockets, so haven't had a need for them yet. This mall was massive and yes I kinda got lost in it too. Why one mall need so many shops that sells gold is beyond me. You can even buy the religious outfit Muslim gals wear in Louis Vuitton, Armani and Gucci. Apparently a girl got to have her outfit, shoes and handbag matching even if its all black.

The next morning was going to be the test to see if Flight Centre got it right. I had two things booked for the day a city tour in the morning and a night safari in the desert. Now I have been on the city tour before however since Dubai keep building new buildings every 5 minutes I thought it would be a good Idea to do it again. I was meant to meet the tour bus people at my Hotel reception around 8:30am I waited and waited and started getting really worried, about 15 – 20min later they finally showed up today might actually turn out ok.

We drove around town for a bit visiting the last Sheiks summer palace its pretty much a shack on a dirt patch especially when you compare them to the present royal families palaces which would put any European Royal family to shame. Driving around town was also kind of weird seeing all the buildings in real life after having watched many programs about them on National Geographic. The Burj Dubai Tower being one of them, looked like something that was alive and growing out of the ground. After driving around for awhile and visiting a number of places we got a water taxi's across the Dubai Creek and being a tourist focused tour they took us to the markets to buy shit. At the end they took us to a parking lot where everyone on the bus was put on different transport to head back to their hotels. Myself and another couple where the only once to remain on the bus alongside the tour guide and the driver. The other couple was dropped of very quickly, the tour guide got dropped of at a mall and then it was just me. A whole bus to myself the whole way back to the hotel its nice when your treated in the manor that your deserving of :P .

After having a quick shower and changing into some warmer clothes I went downstairs to the reception to meet the tour bus company again. This time I would head to the desert and have dinner under the stars. We where picked up in a 4x4 it was me an Australian couple and two girls from the Czech Republic. We drove for ages to get out of the city and finally arrived at a national park which name escapes me now. When we arrived there was already other 4x4 waiting I think in total there would have been about 20 4x4s that would be occupying as on the desert excursion. The drivers let the tyres down a bit before we all set off. Our first stop was a falcon show where they demonstrated a few tricks with a young falcon. While we where watching the falcon show a wild falcon came swooping pass trying to drive the tame one out of its territory.

We continued on for a while driving around like idiots on the sand dunes and every so often spotting a few Onyx's. We made one a stop in the middle of no where to watch the sun set before dinner. Even thought there was a lot of people with us, sitting on the dune looking out in front of you and seeing nothing but desert and the sun setting is kind of spiritual and very relaxing for the soul. Its something you should really experience and even though the desert is just sand and a few shrubs there is something amazingly beautiful about it. After the sun set we headed to a Bedouin camp, well it was a fake one tourist trap. Here we had dinner and got to ride on a camel around the camp. The food was amazing and I have to say when I get to Canadia I'm buying an Arabic cooking book. While eating we were treated to a belly dancing show, this girl kept going for a solid 30mins I was just exhausted watching. All in all it was a amazing night under the starts in an Arabian desert. Even thou it all was a bit of a tourist trap and designed to cater for tourist which I generally hate, this however was still worth doing and personally I can't wait for my next adventure that takes me to Dubai.