6AM Monday we left Columbus for JFK, from JFK to Dubai. Both plane rides were fairly uneventful. Other than the 4 year old on the flight to Dubai who had the stamina to scream every 15 minutes for the entire 13 hour flight. I kept thinking that she would wear out and go to sleep – she never did. She screamed until the very end, I’m sure that she was screaming for some very important reason – like, she wanted to watch Cinderella instead of Sleeping Beauty. AP managed to watch 6 movies while restraining himself from causing an international incident with the girl’s parents, and I kept myself entertained with episodes of The Office and Arrested Development with a few video games for good measure. We landed in Dubai at 7AM local time, grabbed our bags (none were lost!!!) and hopped in a cab for our hotel.
The hotel set us up with a driver (Musinkhan) for a tour around town in a Toyota Landcruiser that turned out to be a three hour tour of his buddy’s tourist trap shops including a Muslim art museum that was not a museum at all, but rather a fancy tourist trap that sold the things that were on display. Riiiight.
Exhausted from the 110 degree heat and all of the “no thank you-ing” the high pressure vendors, we finally made it to the part of the tour that we were looking forward to the most – amazing buildings. Man, those people in Dubai love to build things. At any given moment we could see 5 to 10 skyscrapers under construction. There were cranes and construction fences everywhere. I’m not sure who they are building all of those skyscrapers for, our cabdriver, Mosinkhan just said that they like to build a lot. By the end of the three hour tour we were all thoroughly exhausted. Everyone but AP fell asleep on the way back to our hotel. We checked into our room, then scrarfed some pizza at the place across the street before taking a long nap.
At 4:30 we boarded the Landcruiser again with a different adventure ahead. We booked a tour called “DUNE BASHING” that I was particularly excited about. Tim agreed that anything with the word “BASHING” is going to be great. As Mosinkhan pulled off the road into the dessert we realized what dune bashing is: pushing the Toyota Landcruiser to its limits – driving up sand dunes and flying off of them. Of course, trying to take pictures of this event is like trying to capture the experience of riding a roller coaster with still pictures. Later we found out the Maoinkhan is an expert Landcruiser driver, complete with a special license to drive in the dessert. We all agreed that the good folks at Toyota should make their way out to Dubai to film a commercial. The glory of sliding sideways down a sand dune with a car full of people screaming a laughing with excitement would definitely sell a few more Landcruisers.
The hotel set us up with a driver (Musinkhan) for a tour around town in a Toyota Landcruiser that turned out to be a three hour tour of his buddy’s tourist trap shops including a Muslim art museum that was not a museum at all, but rather a fancy tourist trap that sold the things that were on display. Riiiight.
Exhausted from the 110 degree heat and all of the “no thank you-ing” the high pressure vendors, we finally made it to the part of the tour that we were looking forward to the most – amazing buildings. Man, those people in Dubai love to build things. At any given moment we could see 5 to 10 skyscrapers under construction. There were cranes and construction fences everywhere. I’m not sure who they are building all of those skyscrapers for, our cabdriver, Mosinkhan just said that they like to build a lot. By the end of the three hour tour we were all thoroughly exhausted. Everyone but AP fell asleep on the way back to our hotel. We checked into our room, then scrarfed some pizza at the place across the street before taking a long nap.
At 4:30 we boarded the Landcruiser again with a different adventure ahead. We booked a tour called “DUNE BASHING” that I was particularly excited about. Tim agreed that anything with the word “BASHING” is going to be great. As Mosinkhan pulled off the road into the dessert we realized what dune bashing is: pushing the Toyota Landcruiser to its limits – driving up sand dunes and flying off of them. Of course, trying to take pictures of this event is like trying to capture the experience of riding a roller coaster with still pictures. Later we found out the Maoinkhan is an expert Landcruiser driver, complete with a special license to drive in the dessert. We all agreed that the good folks at Toyota should make their way out to Dubai to film a commercial. The glory of sliding sideways down a sand dune with a car full of people screaming a laughing with excitement would definitely sell a few more Landcruisers.
It would look something like this:
A self portrait while dune bashing:
After about an hour of crazy dune bashing fun, we stopped at a camel farm to take some pictures with the indigenous dessert animals. After camels we drove to a different part of the dessert (more dune bashing in between) to ride a few camels and have dinner. We jumped on some camels and took a ride.
"Can I have a ride on you -- camel?"
Although they were a little uncomfortable, we had a small caravan of camel fun. The sheik leading our caravan even took my camera to snap a few shots of us as we traveled. At the end of the trip the camel gently bent his long front legs down and folded them one joint at a time until he lowered us to the ground. We made our way to the dinner set up – sat at tables that were low to the ground on pillows. Before dinner we got tattooed up by the henna lady and drank enough Orange Fanta for a group twice our size. Dinner was a Mediterranean buffet that had the best hummus that I’ve ever tasted. We also had lots of kinds of shish (that’s kabobs). All in all, it was a fantastic dinner in a super cool setting (the middle of the dessert). How did we get here? What an amazing day in Dubai – we made our way back to the hotel and crashed around 10PM Dubai time.
4 comments:
DUBAI SOUNDS CRAAAAZY! Glad you enjoyed.
Dune Bashing looks awesome! How badly did AP want to be driving. You both are missed a lot. Bfey
HOLY MOLY. that is all I can say. I cannot believe I missed all these posts! I guess its cuz this is the first time I have sat at my computer all day. I have been frantically working on my wedding mall office with Jenn all day. SHOO! My arms are tired from hanging BLIK and spray painting decorations. Paul and the two weekers are on their way - but will be arriving a day or two late. I am sure you are already aware. I wish I was there. I miss you lots.
So proud of AP, btw, for the driving situation. That would be my WORST nightmare.
Whaaaaaaat? That is a ridiculous start to your trip!!! You guys are freakin movie stars. Stay safe. :)
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