Day Trip to Dubai

Hello all and happy Columbus Day! In honor of Columbus day I went and discovered a new country- Dubai. I went with a friend from work and we made a quick trip to Dubai just for fun... Its nice that it is only an hour flight, so we were able to turn it into a nice day trip. We had a fabulous day. We took the Big Bus Tour and saw a lot of Dubai. Due to the lack of time we were not able to get out and really explore or experience a lot, but we did SEE a lot. I took quite a few pictures, so I hope you enjoy the few I have posted. My co-worker will also be giving me pictures, so watch for them! Dubai is very similar to Kuwait in the way it looks, that they have just many crazy drivers, the temperature, and the fact that arabic is the recognized language. Dubai is very different in the sense that it is much greener and they have parks (millions and millions of dollars goes into keeping the parks somewhat green). Also, Dubai does not stink as bad (the fish market stuck pretty bad, but that is to be expected), is much cleaner, and you actually see people holding hands in public. Dubai is a very tourist centered place as well, where Kuwait isn't so much. So, we saw and met a wide variety of people there.

Dubai is known for doing everything bigger and better. They have some really neat things there and in a few years when Dubai land is built, which is supposed to be much larger then Disney World, it may be a nice excuse to go back! Okay, here is my one day adventure...

We took a taxi (my first time ever riding in a taxi by the way) to the first stop where we could join up with the Big Bus Tour. Here is me minutes before we began our adventure and excited for the fun day ahead.

I learned that there is a lot of Egyptian influence in Dubai. There is a mall that had a lot of hieroglyphs on the buildings and these massive statues were all around. We only had 5 minutes to snap some pictures and jump on the bus again for the next destination. I love how I am completly dwarfed by the statues...

We learned some history of Dubai and interesting facts along the way. This picture is of the medical block which contains some of the worlds greatest treatment facilities.

This is one of the original watch towers erected to protect the city from invasion. It doesn't appear to tall to me, but I guess it is tall enough!

No matter where you are in the world, you can always spot a yellow school bus!

I appologize I didn't get a better picture then this, but we were moving and my camera is slow. Anyway, you see workers all over hauling a great load of goods by hand in these pull carts. It looked mighty tiring considering the heavy load and the fact that it is over a hundred degrees out!

This picture shows the locked in boats. All along the shore line were these boats, packed in... how they ever get out is a mystery. I think people must live on these boats because we could see people sitting on the boats and there was a lot of laundry that looked like it was air drying.

We jumped off the bus tour and caught an hour long cruise tour. It was overall very disappointing, becuase the things we saw and the little interesting facts shared were the same as we already heard and saw from the bus tour. It was still nice to float down the river!

Our next stop on the journey was probably my favorite. We went to the mall which houses the indoor ski slope! My friend so graciously allowed me to go ski for an hour and I had a great time! I can now say I skied the black diamond of Dubai (okay, they only had 3 runs which were not that long nor that difficult, but I did the hardest they had!) They provide you with all the equipment to include snow pants and a coat- good deal! Overall skiing cost me about $50, but how cool is that to go skiing while in the desert?!!! It is my kind of skiing, too- go ski for a short time and when you are done get right back to enjoying the 100+ degree weather! Perfect! I bought a ski Dubai t-shirt and on the back it says, "Weather Update: Dubai's Getting Cooler". Too funny! While skiing I met the cutest kids from Spain. They must have only been about 5 years old, spoke perfect english with no accent and were loving skiing. I also met a lady from Holland who was enjoying the snow! Good times!

Dubai has a lot of man-made islands. They have created one in the shape of a tree and is refered to as the Palms- it has become the eighth wonder of the world. It is visible from space - that is how large this thing is! On the island there is the Atlantis hotel which is this huge palace of a place. I'm sure it is very nice inside!

Dubai has another hotel which is the only 7 star hotel in the world. It is in the shape of a sail from a boat and it sits on its own island. They offer a taxi service from the airport to the hotel, with the taxi being a helicopter! There is a tennis court way high up in the air which all the greats have come just to play there! I'll get a picture of it posted on my next blog. Our last stop for the day was visiting another mall that contains one of the largest acquariums in the world. We did the ultimate acquarium experience so we got to walk through the acquarium tunnel, visit the underwater zoo, and take a boat tour of the acquarium. The tunnel was really neat since it felt you were in the acquarium and the fish were so close. The underwater zoo was neat, because they had some large crabs and cool looking creatures. In the zoo they had penguins.... what country am I in with snow and penguins??? Anyway, it made me laugh and I got a picture just for you Jess! The boat tour was really neat becuase the boat has a glass bottom and we got to feed the fish. The masses of fish would jump and splash when the food was thrown it- it was pretty fun to watch. Since the dollar is stronger then the UAE Dirham (1 Dirham is $3.60 USD), the ultimate package only cost about $25! It was worth it since it was really neat.

These sharks were so close- it was cool. There are such awesome looking creatures in the ocean!

Well, that concluded my day. From there we grabbed a quick bite to eat and then got a taxi to take us back to the airport. I left my apartment at 5:00am and got back at 12:30am. It was a quick trip, but we did, and saw, quite a bit. I was kind of sad we didn't have time to go visit the souks, but that is probably a good thing as it kept me from spending more money. It was a good trip. I'm glad I got to go.

I'm even more glad that I got to enjoy the rest of General Conference today. What powerful testimonies and such great messages shared. I love General Conference!