Day 2 -Desert Safari

I had been looking forward to this tour and it didn't disappoint. We were collected from our hotel and headed about 35 minutes out of the city.

Our first stop was at the gates of the Dubai Desrt Conservation Reserve. Here the driver dropped the tyre pressure from 45 to 15.

We headed off through dunes weaving our way through them in a convoy of about 30 vehicles. It was lots of fun and the driver was excellent.

After about 1/2 hour of bouncing around the back of the vehicle, we stopped to watch the sun set. It was amazing how quickly it set. It almost look like it was sliding down behind the sand dune.

Once the sun had set, we jumped back in the vehicle and headed off to a compound of Bedouin tents. When we arrived there was a choice to have a short ride on a camel. Who can pass up a camel ride?....when in Rome as they say. 

As they say, camels are very smelly creatures but ours was well behaved. It was very funny when we had to get off. The handler told us to lean right back as the camel knelt down and I did this, but didn't realise it's a two part process. I relaxed at the wrong time and nearly got thrown off the front of the camel. I was laughing but I thought the handler was going to have a heart attack.

After that bit of excitement we enjoyed a great meal and a belly dancing performance. We ate with a lovely couple from Adelaide that were staying at our hotel. As we were chatting we found that they had stayed at the same villa were are booked into at Santorini. The told us it was an absolutely perfect villa and the hosts were beautiful.  Looking foward to Santorini even more now.

This was the end of our stay in Dubai. We've had a fantastic time so it's time to pack for the next leg...London here we come!

Day 2 -The Miracle Garden

This garden is quite a way out of the city in the middle of the desert. It is 2000sq metres of garden that consists structures completely covered in plants.

Unfortunately now is at the end of the season and it's starting to look quite sad but you can still see how beautiful it would be in high season

You wander around the garden and you come across cottages and castles

They even have an Eiffel Tower...we'll have to see how it compares with the real thing.

And the Burj Khalifa. I would love to come back early in the season and at night because I think it would be spectacular. Maybe next time.

Day 2 The Mall of the Emirates

Have you noticed we are spending a lot of times in Malls?

That's because they are not just malls, they usually have some incredible attraction in them. Oh, and they're cool!

The Mall of the Emirates has a ski slope! It's the weirdest thing, outside the it's 42°C and you walk into this mall and there's a full size ski slope! It still amazes me what you can do with enough money.

Not only do they have a ski slope, they have toboggin runs as well. You stand at the window looking at all of it and find it hard to believe what you are looking at.

But that was not the best bit for Terry...he's a big fan of "The Big Bang Theory". He actually watched two full series on the flight to Dubai. This mall has a Cheescake Factory.

He was so excited that we had to go in and have something. Neither of us were hungry but we decided if you are in the "Cheesecake Factory" you have to have cheesecake. We had coffee and the most delicious white chocolate, caramel and macadamia cheesecake. I think it's best cheescake I've ever had! The only down side there was no Penny to serve us....not even anyone that looked remotely like Penny!

I Ithink I need lessons from Catherine in taking selfies. 

The restaurant is at the bottom of the ski slope so you sit there and watch people on the slope.

Day 1 - City of Merchants tour

To fill in the end of our day we took a tour around the city. This is the one we probably would have missed if we took that later flight.

First stop was the Dubai beach from where we could see one of the few 7 star hotels in the world. It even has it's own helipad. We just need Gregg to buy us a winning tattslotto ticket and we could pick up a helicopter and go and stay there.

The beach was beautiful and clean and the water was warm. We were surprised there wern't more people on the beach. Apparently 37°C isn't warm enough even though it was late afternoon.

From the beach you could see the islands that make up a map of the world. When we get that helicopter we will go back and get a view from the air.

After that we basically did a few drive-bys, big shopping centres, a mosque (which we did stop for but weren't allowed in, don't really see the point of that!), and the prince's house ( well, within one kilometre because if you get any closer they shoot you! The armed guards were out the front ready and waiting.)

We moved on to an original emirates government building an then to the museum which was much more interesting.

The museum was really good and some of the mannequins were very realistic. You might see it in the photo but this one kind of freaked me out be it felt like one of those paintings where the eyes follow you.

Next stop was a water taxi that took us to the spice and gold souks (market). It was just like being being back  Phuket..."Madam, I have very nice bag for you...very nice copy just like real Versace"  or "Madam, I have very nice pashmina for you" . At least they were honest about selling knock-offs. Oh, and the gold souk...that's where we could picked out our "Rolax" watch!

Day 1 - The Dubai Mall continued

With the Aquarium ticked off our list of things to do we went on to explore the rest of the centre.

The shops were beautiful and it's the place to be if you want any high end products. At the entrance there was Tiffany's and Rolex just to name a few if you wanted something sparkly and expensive. Unfortunately they didn't have anything we liked otherwise we would have bought something to bring back for you all 

There were "normal" shops too, and I think the next Social Club Shopping trip should be to the The Dubai Mall. Might bring that up at the next meeting. I'm not a shopper but there were sooo many beautiful clothes and things would like buy, that I'm sure I would improve my shopping skills significantly. Maybe the next trip I will only pack one change of clothes and pick up the rest in Dubai on my way over.

Terry persuaded me to keep moving through the mall because at the far end is the tallest building in the world...the Burj Khalifa. It's so tall we couldn't get the whole building in the photo.

They also have this incredible water fountain the shoots water 200 metres up into the air. Unfortunately it only runs twice daily and we weren't able to make it at those times. Definitely something we will have to see next time.

Have you noticed we are only two days into the holiday and I'm already planning the next trip. Might need to discuss a pay rise with Hutchy.

The Irish Invasion

Here are few more photos we took around the hotel...like Terry getting up close and personal with the wildlife.

Not sure if you can see, in the photo of Terry with the horseshoe camel, but that's the Irish Village in the background. 

I think we should be less concerned about the middle eastern population taking over the world and more concerned about the Irish. Have you noticed they pop up everywhere! Even the first person I spoke at the Dubai airport was Irish!

Mmmm...I might have interrogate Ann when I get home

This photo was in front of the hotel restaurant where they served the most diverse breakfast buffet I've ever seen. There was our tradition type of cereal bacon and eggs but then you walked around the corner and they had fried rice and stirfries or curries or cold meats and cheese. There was just about anything you wouldn't expect to see on a breakfast.

Day 1 Dubai Mall - The Aquarium

Our first destination was the Dubai Mall. Our hotel is about 15 minutes from the hotel and it was a great chance to see the amazing buildings as we got closer. The thing that has struck us most is how clean and well maintained the city is.

At the mall is an aquarium so we thought we go and check out as everything seems to be bigger and better here in Dubai. As you walk into the mall you can't miss it...the tank is huge and teeming with fish. I didn't realise how big it was until I noticed a diver feeding the fish. 

The aquarium is divided up into sections. First you walk under the tank through a tunnel. The aquarium is split over three levels and we found it a bit difficult to work out where to go next. At first we thought the tunnel was it and we thought we had wasted our money, but luckily we found the other parts and was more impressed with what we saw.

We had a tour of what goes in behind the scenes and how the tanks worked. We then went on to see an amazing array of tanks and fish.

I think when we get home our fishtank might undergo a renovation.

Dubai - our arrival

We arrived at the Dubai airport at about 5:30am and we were checking into our hotel by 6:30am. That's the quickest we've got through. They didn't even check our bags...they just waived us through, obviuosly didn't look like a threat to national security. Wondering if it was the eyes hanging out of heads that made them feel sorry for us?

Our hotel is beautiful and the room is huge with the best hotel bathroom I think we've ever had! The shower alone is almost bigger than our ensuite at home.

The hotel lift is freaking Terry out because it'all glass, we're on the ninth floor and he hates heights! My challenge is to get him to turn around and look at the view...not looking good at the moment but I still have about 15 hours to achieve my goal.

The Flight

We've arrived in Dubai and what a start to our trip!

Before we left for the airport Terry was trying to work out how we get a free upgrade. After much discussion we decided we could never be that lucky.  Guess what? Apparently we are that lucky! While we were waiting in line to check our luggage in their was a guy from Emirates asking if anyone was only flying to Dubai. We put our hand up and he offered us an upgrade to Business Class and another free economy flight to Dubai that would have to be used in the next 12 months. But as always there was a catch. We would to wait another 5 hours after our original departure time of 9:30pm. It meant that we would have been at the airport for about 8 hours.

The upshot of all this us we decided to decline (hard decision) because of the waiting and we would lose 1/2 a day in Dubai. Our flight in economy turned out to be OK. The sun was rising toward the end of the flight so I took some photos with my tablet through the window so the quality is not great but it was too pretty not to try and capture. It looked like a tequila sunrise. Pity it was so early in the morning as I may have ordered one to drink to celebrate it