3-24-12–Dubai Arabian Nights

OH BOY was it windy! Gotta love being in the middle of a desert with a cranking wind. Um, sand like blows everywhere. Hard. Well, we made the best of it anyway.

The guide picked us up at our hotel as well as a German couple and a young lady from Seoul. The guide said nothing, and none of us talked to each other. It was kind of weird, especially coming on the heels of our great driver in Kenya, Newton, who would tell us about his country all the time, pointing out scenes and giving us historical backgrounds. Actually, none of our drivers in Dubai said anything. It was really irritating.

Anyway, off we went driving, driving, driving in his Nissan Armada (with roll bars!). We finally reached the gates of the reserve.

The mute driver hopped out and deflated out tires. We waited while several other trucks did the same then it was off to go “dune bashing.” Weeelllll, guess I really shouldn’t have eaten that huge lunch at the hotel because all that rolling and bouncing and turning and sliding was, uh, a little uncomfortable (don’t worry, I didn’t throw up!). The ride initially was pretty awesome but then, and I know I speak for Brad too, it just got plain old. We were like, “OK, where’s the little tent camp? Had enough of this!”

We did stop for a couple photo opportunities and a cool falconry demonstration (this photo would totally rock but I didn’t catch the whole bird) but we finally reached a snuggly little camp deep in the dunes.

The tent camp was actually pretty cool. There were many tables set up low to the ground with big cushions for seats. There was also a belly dancing “stage” area with more cushions, a sand bottle guy (we paid about 4x what they sold for in the airport, darn it!), a henna lady (still have the funky pattern on my hand – it kind of makes me look like I should be on Stargate or Star Trek), a bar and a lot of food. We got bowls of tasty tidbits and were sitting back to relax when the tour folks said that dinner was served. Huh? Well what was that we just ate, then? Oh, just appetizers. Ugh. Anyway, it was pretty good. Then it was time for belly dancing. I hope she really enjoyed it (she looked like she did). We met two families from Sugar Land. Small world.

Finally, the night wrapped up and we head back to the Marco Polo hotel (nice place, but be sure to get a non-smoking room if they have them. I didn’t even think about it, they didn’t ask and my backpack still smells). We ordered a 5:40 wake up call and crashed.