United Arab Emirates: DUBAI

(Brett Writing) It was time for another vacation.  We left on Saturday February 6th.  We flew from Cedar City to Salt Lake, to Chicago, then to Atlanta.  We spent the night in Atlanta and Tiffany got to try "Waffle House" for her first time.  For anyone who's been there before, it wouldn't be unusual to hear that she had chili on her hash browns at 10:30 p.m.  We took our razor scooters with us, so the next day we tried them out all over the city.  Our plane didn't leave until 8:30p that night.  We weren't fortunate enough to sit in first class, but we did get the very back row with just us two.  15 hours later traveling at speeds up to 700mph we arrived in Dubai on Monday evening.  We stayed at the Renaissance Marriott Hotel for the first three nights. and the JW Marriott on the fourth night.

Tuesday Morning we went to the world famous water park called "Wild Wadi".  Which is next to the world famous Burj Al Arab Hotel.  Because it was too cold for the locals (about 80 degrees) we had the park to ourselves.  No waits for any ride.  There were Three main attractions we did, a water slide that is "a speed slide that hurtles you at speeds of up to 80 kms per hour, cascading a breathtaking 33 metres,"  a wave pool that you go boogie boarding on, and a tubing ride that shoots you uphill multiple times then shoots you downhill in slides.  Think of it like going tubing down a river with waterfalls, but backwards.   

Later that day we saw the world's tallest building Burj Khalifa, followed by a late night lobster buffet in our Hotel.  Well, it was much more than Lobster, but that's pretty much I (Brett) ate.  Actually the buffet had anything and everything you could have wanted to eat.  

Wednesday we took our razor scooters out on the town.  FYI, no one outside of Utah knows what a scooter is.  In Atlanta and Dubai we would get constant stares of curiosity from everyone.  As we would ride by people would frantically get out of the way like we were on a speeding bike or something.  Sometimes when we rode slow the locals would stop us and ask "where you buy that?!" "How much?!" as they pointed to the scooter. 

We got to know the streets and the metro stations well that day.  We found the oldest building in Dubai, aka, the Dubai Museum. It used to be a fort to protect the city and had some pretty neat history. 

The Dubai Museum is actually way bigger than it looks like from the outside.  It costs about 60 cents (USD) per person to get in.  There's a few things in the courtyard area, but then you go underground and it's huge.  Room after room of history stuff, Dubai history and also Middle Eastern history.  40 years ago there was nothing in Dubai.  They make it seem "so long ago." We packed up our stuff and went to the airport to catch our flight home that evening. Unfortunately, the United flight had been cancelled because of snow back in Washington D.C. where it was supposed to land, so all those passengers got booked onto our Delta flight, which in turn left no room for us. Luckily, the Renaissance agreed to give us the room at the same rate for a couple more nights. We also got a room for some other stranded standbys. 

Burj Khalifa, The tallest building in the world

Mmmmm... Sweet and Sour chicken w/flat bread and an Arabic "Mtn. Dew."

Thursday (Tiffany Writing) we slept in, then went shopping at a nearby market.  They had some great deals and really cute clothes.  I got a long skirt for $4 and two t-shirts for $2 each. Brett got a nice belt for just a few bucks. We grabbed some chicken tacos for about 50 cents each from one of the street vendors and they were the best ever. They are a lot like the ones in Tijuana. We moved all of our belongings to the JW Marriott where we would stay our last night, because the associate rate was no longer available at the Renaissance. 

(Brett Writing) We went on the Dhow River Dinner Cruise that night.  They call the boats "floating restaurants."  Once you see how many dinner boats are on the river, you conclude that the river is pretty much only used for dinner cruises now days.  The dinner cruise included a Buffet, dancing (dancing = guy dressed in various funny costumes dancing up and down the isle with incredibly loud music followed by no one clapping because they're so angry that the music was so loud) as the boat goes up and down the river once, then followed by going in circles in the river to take up more time.  It was really cool though to see the buildings along the river all lit up at night.  We decided to not even try to fly home this day because the flights were still oversold by about 30 paying passengers.

Friday  (Tiffany Writing) We ventured down a few blocks to find the clock tower that is a well known landmark in the city. The night before on our way to the dinner cruise we passed it and realized it was closer than we thought! We had a great lunch of sweet and sour chicken, pictured earlier in the blog.

Our last tour was the Desert Safari and our very most favorite part of the trip. Thank goodness we got stuck or we would have never experienced this! We were picked up at our hotel in Toyota Land Cruisers and sped through the city and out to the desert where we arrived at a sea of sand dunes.  There were about 6 Cruisers in our caravan and to be honest we weren't expecting much. Just the usual tourist paced going up and down sand dunes. I thought it was going to be so laid back I even took off my seatbelt when we pulled into the sand dunes. What a mistake that was! After briefly pausing to plan a course of action with the other drivers, our driver gunned it and we went straight up the side of a dune, got air, and Brett and I both hit our heads hard into the top of the jeep as went flying down the other side,. It was crazy! They would never allow such things in the U.S. No safety restraints, no waivers, no warnings. It was just like a theme park rollcoaster, but with no guarantees that you won't die. I couldn't stop laughing and my stomach was in knots, I even get motion sick just like on a rollercoaster. We were flying, sliding, and cruising! The cruisers drive so close to each other that it's scary, I wouldn't even drive that close going 25mph on a straight road. And not only that, but there were little sand buggies with Arabs in them all over the place. I have no idea how we didn't crash into someone. Our caravan finally stopped up on top of some dunes for some picture taking. After a brief rest everyone hesitantly and excitedly climbed back in the cruisers for the last half of the journey back out.  Our cruiser got stuck several times and scared the begebies out of me at least a dozen times as we slid sideways down the sand dune because we couldn't make it straight up the face. It was interesting to watch the drivers navigate the dunes and use the bowls to sling shot us around and up and over. What an experience!

 

 After completing the ride, they drove us to a large camp in the middle of the desert where we got to ride camels, go sand boarding (just like on the snow, but on sand), try on traditional dress, eat dinner, and watch some traditional dancing. All of the women were invited up on the stage for the last dance, and I was one of the brave few who went up and tried to learn some sort of belly dance. What a fun day!

 

 

We went to the airport that night and thankfully got a seat on the plane, and not just any seat but we got Business Class. We had sleeper pods, all you can eat food, and all you can watch movies.Needless to say it was a great flight home.

After arriving in Atlanta the fun was over as we thought we would be stuck there for days. It snowed the night before and every morning flight in and out to everywhere had been cancelled. I've never seen so many people in an airport before! People were lined up and down the terminals on the floor and every seat was taken. After trying to get on several flights to anywhere (Salt Lake, Phoenix, Denver, Texas, etc...) and being numbers 94 and 95 on the standby list (not even close to making it), we decided there was no chance of getting anywhere on Delta. We made our way over to the United terminal since we are able to fly standby on United as well. Our first try was a flight to Denver and somehow we made it, we were the last two passengers and they shut the door right as we stepped in. Once in Denver we caught a flight to Salt Lake and then a flight to St. George where we had a car waiting for us. 

What a trip...