On the morning of our last day in Dubai, we took a Tours by Locals tour of several neighborhoods. It was supposed to be a walking tour using public transportation to get around, but our guide suggested we make it a driving tour due to the heat. Even though it wasn’t terribly hot that day, it was a good decision.
The first neighborhood was the marina area. The towers are for misting on a very hot day. We were there early in the morning and the streets were deserted. Our guide said most people come out in the evening.
Of course, there were distinctive tall buildings.
Of course, this is the world’s tallest Ferris wheel. Unfortunately, the gears were not properly designed for the sand and salt air, so it is presently non functional until a solution is found.
This is a unique restaurant where you sit in small air conditioned pods.
Note the twisted building in the left center. I don’t know if it is the most twisted building in the world.
They had a play area for children.
I badly needed a haircut, but I thought it would be cheaper to wait until I was home in two days.
The next neighborhood we visited was Palm Jumeirah. It is man made islands in the shape of a palm tree. It is not really possible to see the palm tree from the ground. We essentially drove down the trunk and the side roads were labeled “Frond A”, etc. At the top of the tree, there is a strip around the top of the tree called The Crescent which can be reached through a tunnel under the water. In this picture we are looking across the water at the Atlantis Hotel on the crescent.
The Atlantis has built an additional hotel further down the crescent. It has 92 pools (some of which are hot tubs).
The Palm has a number of five star hotels on the crescent.
There were views across the water of the Burj Al-Arab or sail hotel, the only seven star hotel in the world with rooms costing $24,000 per night. The bottom picture is a hazy view of the business district with the Burj Kahlifa towering over the other high rises.
In the afternoon and evening we took a dune buggy ride in the desert followed by dinner and entertainment at a desert resort. As you can see the “buggies” were nice air conditioned four wheel drive vehicles with air conditioning. We got the senior ride which did not include some of the scarier maneuvers. It was still exciting enough for us and threw us around the car quite a bit. They let some of the air out of the tires for riding the dunes. This picture is at the end of the ride and he is preparing to refill the tires prior to driving on the highway.
The sand was reddish and the dunes were pretty. The sand was very soft and difficult to walk on.
This is the entrance to the resort where we had dinner. There might have been a hundred people there that night, but it could accommodate many more.
We were there for the sunset.
The entertainment included music, belly dancing, whirling dervishes, and much more. The food was a middle eastern buffet.
After dinner, we got back to our hotel, the Taj Dubai, at about 9:30. We got packed and left for the airport an hour later to begin a trip of over 24 hours back home. All our flights were on time and we got back home with no problems. We were exhausted, but happy to be home. The highlights of the trip for me were Iguazu Falls, Rio, West Africa, the Seychelles, and Dubai.