So it was a day like no other, why not try something different yet not so crazy at the same time, why not go skydiving? There is a parachute center not too far off north Cambridge (about 50km) which offer runway and skydiving services. Here people of all ages and experience come here for dives using the parachute center’s planes for “the lift”, so technically anyone here who is a certified sky diver can hop on the plane and jump off throughout the day. For me and my friends without any prior experience, we will be doing tandem dives.

It costs about £250 for a tandem dive, which involves you being strapped to an senior instructor who will be doing the jump. He or she will train you before boarding the plane on the proper techniques of jumping, like exiting the plane, what to do in a jump how to regulate airflow/speed and what to do in emergencies. Your instructor is very much your lifeline and the one who call the shots during the jump.

Apparently my tandom instructor had been jumping for decades and this is easily over his 10 thousandth jump to date. So as I learnt. Despite this being a tandem jump, the experience is the same as jumping out by yourself and not strapped to another 100 odd kg guy behind you. The best part of the dive is the acceleration you get for first 3 seconds after you leave the plane. You get this awesome feeling of the rapid acceleration no other roller-coaster can mimic on the drop phase, only this time you are exposed to the elements with the world spining all around you. And no, there are no bars to hold onto like on a roller coaster.

wheeee!

WHO’s the man!

behold the fast approaching ground!

You get this somewhat disorientating spin, seeing the horizon all around you as you leap off the plane, just like the rush of sea water all around you when you do a back-flip off a boat while scuba diving- you take a few seconds to get your orientation right and open up your arms to start the decent proper. Here is where you adopt the “trademark” arms and legs open stance so as to get the maximum drag of air around your body. Close your arms in to speed up the dive and vice-versa. upon reaching terminal velocity, all you can is this feel of constant wind rushing past you and the warm sun in your face at peace with the world.

It’s not long after (about 20-30 seconds) where you reach the below the 10,000 ft mark to start to pull the chute, the altitude is read from a wrist worn altimeter. Here you will start the long gliding decent down back to earth. The instructor and myself did some rather interesting mid air stunts, such as spins and barrel rolls with our more maneuverable rectangles chute. Generally 6 consecutive spins is somewhat manageable until you pull so much Gs (feeling extremely heavy) off your harness it feel really scary thinking your carabiners might just rip off your chute at any time! Here “walking on air” is really true, seldom can you see nothing between your feet and just the ground thousand off feet below you.

It’s not long where we did a circle for a proper approach and decent to the landing fields, we did a sliding landing we stick both our legs forward and slide on our buttocks on the forward. This is generally recommended for heavier tandem landings and lower risk of possibility breaking your legs on a too fast decent.

And excellent jump. Come to think about it, now the number of plane take-offs and landings for me now will never ever match for now.

You can view more photos of the jump here.

What other better way to chill out and cool off in the Dubai desert heat than a day out at a water park by the beachside and Persian sea? The Wild Wadi Water Park is situated along the beach side Jumeirah, Dubai, next to the Burj Al Arab and the Jumeirah Beach Hotel. The water park is operated by Jumeirah International, a Dubai-based hotelier.

WadiWadi

Got slide?

And we are in!

All day tickets to the park will set you back 200 AED which is about $50, do remember to pack some sunblock as it can get rather burning here in Dubai, unless if you want a sunburn to remember. You will be issued a wrist strap upon entry which serves as your personal cash-free wallet which you use for your locker access as well as tap and go cashless payments for food purchases and the park’s gift shop. You can top up any refundable amount starting into your strap anytime at your discretion.

The place is decked out with variety of tube rides which encircles the whole park, including two flowriders and a lazy river. Various tube slides encircles the perimeter of the park which makes up the master blaster tube ride.

A flowrider!

Got tube queue?

Uphill boost!

The wadi wadi master blaster tube slides are best described as water roller coasters, which can even defy gravity at some points. In this ride, the riders have a choice of single or a double ring tubes, which are propelled upwards with the help of high powered jets, even up the steepest of tube slopes. Many other tube slides make up the master blaster, these rides being the Flood River Flyer, Wadi Leap, White Water Wadi, Falaj Fury, Wadi Twister and Wadi Basher. Each ride segment ends in a splash pool where you can choose to carry on on the next slide or stop halfway but exiting the pool. Carrying on the next slides subsequently brings you to more splash pools, bringing you throughout the park. YOu have a choice of various diversions to chose throughout the tube ride, making each trip up the master blaster a different one.

The park is not very big in size, but is rather tight and compact given the confines of the main Jumeirah road and the Persian gulf beach line which is is built into. The iconic Al Arab 7 star “sail” hotel overlooks the whole park.

The park is laid out with a central walkway from the entrance serving all the major rides along it’s path with several sub-diversions leading to all the respective rides on it’s flanks- which you can exit to. Getting around the park is quite a no-brainer thanks to it small size. Moreover, much of the paved concrete pavements are painted with a rubber-like paint which not only keeps it waterproof but prevents slippages when wet too. These hard pavements are thankfully, also kept cool courtesy of an ingenious integrated sidewalk active sprinkler system, so you don’t burn your feet under the egg-frying hot surface which is typical of most concrete pavement in the desert weather here. Other areas such as steps to the upper areas of the park are covered with rubber mats, very well thought through.

waterworks playground!

Uber cannons included!

Uber splash!

Native to any water park is the waterworks playground, complete with it’s own trademark chiming water bucket which overflows it’s load every 5 minutes or so. It’s always a hit for us big kids who never seem to grow up, much to the dismay of the staff there, as the playground was actually reserved for actual kids, not there were any around for us to piss off, but nonetheless a place for lots of mindless fun with your inner child.

A Wave pool!

churny!

going under…

Lifejackets are available free of cost, for protection for the guests as claimed by the park. These bright red vests are of a universal size which in my opinion will be quite ill-fitting, let be a sight to look at if anyone were to try them on. Not that I see a need for them, but the park recommends using them on the wave pool and non-swimmers alike. Then there are of course the lazy floaters in the active wave pool. The breakers bay is the largest wave pool in the Middle East complete with it’s own synthetic beach decked with deck chairs and goes from a waddle to 5 meters deep at the end of the wave pool. Safety is pretty well covered in the park, with at least 2 active lifeguards on duty per attraction.

under the waves

too shallow!

underwatque!

Camera photography just like in any Dubai tourist attraction is permitted, but what no other better way to experience a pictures on a waterpark than with a waterproof camera? The park’s gift shop do stock and assortment of underwater photography gear, particularly disposable underwater cameras. On top of the usual water park store stuff such as swim wear and shower toiletries. There are even several staff on duty with underwater cameras throughout the park who will take your picture and have you tagged on them so you can view and purchase them from the park’s gift shop.

Try 80kmph down the Jumeirah Sceirah!

Peace out dude!

LOOKIEME!

One of the main attractions in the park will have it be their high speed drop slide, called the Jumeirah Sceirah, it’s a single lane speed slide topping speeds of 80kmph. The slide too reside on the highest point of the park, giving you a great overview of the Downtown Dubai on the east as well as the park, the Al Arab and Jumeirah beachline on the western side. It’s surprising that a water park of this caliber only have one high intensity water ride, which was quite a disappointment, there are no half pipes, looping tunnels, zip-lines, giant funnels, black hole tunnels or even airtime slides.

As a consolation, they do have quite an awesome Flowrider, two in fact, one large open air competition surfer and a straight medium one tucked in the shade.

Hog the flowrider!

All in the day’s work

Knee surf!

Here, the experienced and virgin boarders alike can all have a go at the flowrider, often with hilarious results. The staff will give every guest attempting the attraction a quick run down on the basics as well as leading you on the tricks to perform on the ride, with an occasional stunt or two if they see you up for it.

The learning curve of the flowrider is easy to medium, depending on how you are quick to grasp the feel of the board and balance. if you’ve never tried it before be prepared to undergo a few flops before getting the hang of it. Thereafter you will be more confident to try different surfing positions, flips, 360s, balances and stunts alike. Anyway you can always head back in for another try after another after a flop, just be sure not to hog the machine for too long as the queues can do get rather long as times!

Lazy river is lazy

What rain?

Awesome!

The key to being on the flow rider is to be completely relaxed and use your body weight to lean into the force of the water, almost like skydiving or at least those vertical wind tunnels where you can regulate the flow of fluid around you to control your descend and in this case, your yaw. The flow rider in the body/knee boarding configuration is no different either, just go light on the flow and lean in with the flow and motion.

A visit to the park will be good for 4 hours or so, unless you intend to spend your whole day on the lazy river, beach front or tanning on the wave pool decks, otherwise you will be pretty very much out of attractions by then. Overall the wadi is a nice park with friendly staff to boot, it will be perfect if the place is bigger with more rides.

That’s concludes my trip to the middle east. Do check out my photo galleries for more updates and sights of my middle east trip, after all, a picture is worth a thousands words and more than what I can write here at a go. Cheers and take care!

Dubbed as the world’s leading tourism project at the World Travel Awards in November 2009, Yas Island is a 2,500 hectares tourism city developed at a cost of US$36 billion by Aldar Properties. It is a self sufficient tourist getaway complete with hotels, shopping centers and will feature attractions such as Warner Bros Movie World, Ferrari World, and soon to be announced water parks.

The island is located within Abu Dhabi and is just a 30 minute drive from Dubai. You can get to it from the heart of downtown Abu Dhabi by taking the Shahama Saadiyat Highway through Bisrat Fahid Island and exiting at the Yas island exit.

Ferrari world spotted!

Yas Gardens

The Yas Marina Circuit

There you will be greeted by the Yas garden park, which is surprisingly a rather deserted looking patch of greenery in the middle of nowhere complete with fancy marina styled theming. There you can make you way through the various well demarcated signs pointing to road leading to the soon-to-be-completed attractions all around the island.

As said, Yas island is home to the world’s largest indoor theme park, the Ferrari World. It shouldn’t be too hard to spot the red hulk of a structure sitting on the island. The park also spots the largest Ferrari logo ever made on it’s roof courtesy of the super structure itself designed by Benoy Architects. The park is totally all indoors, allowing the park to operate all year round in all weather conditions, with the exception of the outdoor roller coaster which is still subjected to the elements of the desert, such as occasional sandstorms.

Race circuit entrance

Ferrari world

The Formula Rossa coaster

Also developed by Aldar Properties and managed by Farah Leisure Parks Management, the Ferrari World is the first themed park which carries the official Ferrari trademarked name, presumably through the long standing relations the country has with the Italian car maker. The park is said to bestow guests the best Ferrari Experience to both the young and old. The park spots 20 different rides, featuring a mini racetrack, theater complex, miscellaneous Ferrari driving activities and thrill flat-rides, with the key attraction being the Formula Rossa roller coaster.

The Formula Rossa, also known as the F1 coaster, is the world’s fastest coaster topping an excess of 240kmph through a hill less hydraulic launch similar to that found on Top Thrill Dragster (Cedar point) and Kingda Ka (Six Flags Great Adventure), only that the cable launch run is super extended to achieve the desired record breaking speed. The launch acceleration is said to be “as realistic” to that of a formula 1 car as vouched by Ferrari formula 1 drivers themselves in the park’s promotional campaign.

The coaster was designed Jack Rouse Associates and the manufactured by Intamin. After the launch, the rest of the coaster is pretty much rather tame in nature, with lots of high speed straights and believe it or not, no over-banked turns typical that of Intamin coasters. Other thrill rides in the theme park includes a drop tower and a dual launched Emotion roller coaster.

The front entrance

modeled from a Ferrari GT

Nearby Yas island hotels

On the accommodation side, Yas island spots residential housing through serviced apartments and hotels alike. The island is well served by a variety of hotel options for all middle to high budgets and is also home to a respectable hotel avenue- where all the hotels on the island reside, with the Crowne Plaza and Radisson hotels to name a few. One of the flagship hotels here have to be the Yas Marina Hotel. It spots a Durian-like husk roof and facade, located right in the heart of the Abu Dhabi Grandprix and overlooks the bay side Marina areas of the island.

View from the hotels

Yas hotel front

with it’s own yacht marina

The Yas Marina Circuit undoubtedly the global crown jewel of the establishment. It’s is an FIA approved GP race track and the venue for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix since 2010. The circuit is designed to be used in both the day and night, with a generous amount of lighting at night courtesy of the abundance of flood light towers installed all around the track. The track was designed by Hermann Tilke and is the second Formula One track in the Middle East. The 5.5km racetrack spots 21 turns winding its way through sand dunes, with several long straights, an even mix of corners and a tight hairpin at turn 7. It is the latest addition to the Formula 1 season as of the point of writing.

The marina race track!

Turn 19 of the circuit

Turn 9, 10 and grandstand

There is nothing much about the upcoming Warner brothers theme park, and the claimed giant shopping district area. Out of the Formula 1 season, the place is pretty much a dead town, but we can expect the park at most to be completed in a 2 years or so for the whole island to be completely fully operational. So till then, that would be a good time to check out Yas island again.

Next stop, beating the heat and bearing it out at the Wadi Wadi waterpark.

Abu Dhabi is the capital and the second largest city in the United Arab Emirates. From Dubai, it’s just about a 2 hour drive from the downtown Dubai and the international airport. My journey to the capital starts from from the Ghubaiba bus station, where you can get a regular express bus there for 15AED, which boils down to about 4 dollars. This cross city route is rather popular with the locals too and you won’t see any tourists on this route, with the exception of few travel free & easy savvy travelers who are aware of this route. The buses are rather well equipped, modern with proper air-conditioning. You are even provided under deck storage for bulky items if you should ever have to lug any bulky items or major shopping purchases between the cities.

Ghubaiba Bus Station

omg ticket queue

quiet and smooth 15AED trip

Abu Dhabi lies on a T-shaped island jutting into the Persian Gulf from the central western coast. Soon after we were making our way along Sheikh Zayed Road towards the Dubai-Abu Dhabi highway back into the desert wilderness. It was not until an hour or so where you get to see the first signs of life of a city skyline. Abu Dhabi is the financial heart of the UAE and undoubtedly a very busy one too. Traffic is surprisingly much more heavy in the city as well, there was a massive jam on the highway on our way there, adding over an hour to our traveling time there. The crowd of cars persisted into the heart of the city, with at times, making walking seem the faster option on most of the congested streets here.

along the Sheikh Zayed Road

middle of nowhere

around the city

There are few iconic monuments in the city itself, such as the Al Hosn Fort and cultural center which can be best seen ona pass-by using the public bus transportation. The city is well covered by public transport served from the central bus station itself. A single trip on the bus will set you back only 1 AED and the contact less travel smartcards from Dubai cannot be used here.

around Al Markaziyah

on the bus, with ladies only seats. :3

Marina mall

You can board the bus on any of the 3 entrances of the bendy articulated buses widely deployed on the streets here and depositing your 1 AED in any of the stainless steel boxes at the entrances on your bus boarding or disembarkation, everything based on trust, evenif the bus driver can’t see you boarding from the rear doors. Why board form the rear? this is so as the front seats of all public buses are reserved for women only. so most guys will board from the back or rear carriage entrances (which are also used as exits), which can be rather misleading to people not familiar with the system here, but catching on is not difficult, just watch, learn and read the signs! Our first stop for the day will be the malls along the Al Markaziyah as well the talked about and locally recommended Marina Mall.

marina mall= dolphin fountains

Nicely themed

Emirates palace hotel

The Marina mall is not obscenely big like most malls in Dubai, let be in general here in the UAE. It is too, one of the rather nicely looking ones in my opinion. The mall is decked to an ocean design theme with dolphin fountains and many canvas roofs spanning all the wide open atrium areas of the mall, not only allowing natural sunlight through but give the place a rather modern sail-like oceanquarium feel.

Marina mall marina

to the Heritage center

The Abu Dhabi theater

The marina area is of course, you guessed it home to the southern marina portion of the city, with lots of boat and yacht parking to boot. You can even get views of the Emirates Palace and Eithad Towers from the marina area. Not far off the Marina Village is the Adu Dhabi heritage village. Just a short walk along a straight breakwater off the Havan Cafe it is also home to the Adu Dhabi Theater and you guess it, the world’s tallest free standing flag pole as well.

digging the views!

Nicely framed

the heritage village

The heritage center is home to a mini Arabian village, complete with it’s own mini gardens, a mosque and marketplace. The place is kinda touristy looking at the type of wares they have on display here, which the consideration that no locals would actually frequent such a place anyway. There are few eateries, museums (with some requiring payment for entry), otherwise all the attractions there are all free including entrance to the center itself.

fountain thingies!

in the museums

A mini desert?

The heritage center itself is a nice escape from all the buzz in the city, it’s like it’s own little tranquility spot right in the middle of the marina surrounded by water, complete with man-made parks with shady grass and sandy beaches overlooking the city skyline of Adu Dhabi. This panorama was taken by the marina located on the Breakwater and surrounded by the Persian Gulf.

Besides the nice seaside views, there are even complete replicas of traditional Arabian desert housing, such as outposts and stables, complete with horses and authentic looking livable tents and mud houses, often requiring quite a squeeze into at some occasions. These houses and tents are surprising cool indoors despite the hot surrounding desert heat, that’s desert adaptation and early civil engineering at it’s best!

The beach and skyline

Shade!

Rawr Giant!

Thankfully, the heritage center is most of the time, if not always, void of crowds when I was there, which is good so you more or less have the whole place to explore at your own time without the fear of the tourist rush. The place is however designed to take on huge tourist crowds at a go with the large tour bus parking spaces outside the center giving a hint or two on it’s intended crowd capacity.

quackery

a souk (market) place

stretch hummer!

But otherwise the place is rather quiet most of the time, which is one of the reasons why I like this place. It’s remote location at the end of the marina breakwater and the obvious lack of public transport (with the exception of taxis and the big bus tours) makes it difficult for any traveler getting to the location without transportation. A short hop along the breakwater and it’s not long where we are back at the Marina mall again for our connecting bus back on the road again. This time to another major sight in Adu Dhabi. The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque.

along Sultan Bin Zayed Street

the biggest Mosque in the UAE!

the main building

The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque is the largest mosque in the UAE and was initiated by the late President of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, who is fondly thought of as the father of the UAE. His final resting place is located on the grounds beside the same mosque. It was built at a cost of $ 545 million, the mosque features 82 domes of seven different sizes largest dome at 85 m in height.

The mosque is owned by the Government and as the country’s grand mosque, it is the key place of worship for Friday gathering and Eid prayers, able to take on an excess of 40,000 devotees at a go.

As it being a religious area and tourist attraction second, it pays to observe the few basic rules in the mosque itself. Though photography is generally allowed here but pictures of key personnel tombs, such as that of respected Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan are not allowed. Furthermore, do come appropriately dressed if you are intending to enter the indoor areas of the mosque.

The mosque spots a rather distinctive fusion of Arab, Mughal and Moorish architecture, all decked in intricately designed marble all over. there is even no expense spared on the courtyard marble tiles, which all feature this swirly flower pattern which goes with the over look of the mosque. The indoor areas are no different either, it is huge, allowing prayers to be conducted in air-conditioned comfort.

Already looking good!

beautiful

main prayer stand

The 99 names of Allah are featured on the Qibla wall in traditional Kufi calligraphy, designed by Mohammed Mandi Al Tamimi, a local calligrapher. The Qibla wall also features subtle fibre-optic lighting which glows along the text on the wall. The grand mosque also spots seven imported chandeliers from Germany that incorporate millions of Swarovski crystals. The largest chandelier is the largest known chandelier inside a mosque with a 10m diameter and 15m height taking center stage in the main prayer hall.

The corridors

fountains by the gardens

golden palms

The carpet in the main prayer hall is considered to be the world’s largest carpet, measuring over 60 thousand sq ft, and was made by around 1,300 carpet knotters. Outdoors, the pools are laid in a way along the various mosque arcades that it reflects the tall columns of it’s exterior, allowing mirror image views of the superstructures.

Hilariously at times, security guards here functions as fashion police who will regular kick out tourists dressed too skimpy or not having the appropriate areas (particular the ladies) of their body covered. The general rule of thumb for both men and ladies is to have your shoulders and knees covered as a visitor. Jeans and pants are acceptable including cargo and 3/4 pants like the ones I wore on my visit. If you do not meet any of the dresscode and wish to enter the mosque, special full body white robes will be provided from the Mosque’s main office at no charge.

the washing area

capturing the moment

the Mangrove swamps

The basement areas of the mosque are where the public wash areas are located, they are all air-conditioned and served by eslacateors leading into the various undergroun wings, with the gentlemen and ladies areas located in seperate wings. The toilets even have their own personal duty cleaners who will tend to you with footwear in the toilets as well as keeping the place in tip-top condition.

It’s not long after where we are back on the road again exploring the corniche and mangrove areas of the city. The city is surrounded by an assortment of lakes and mangrove corniches which serves as part of the huge public recreational park areas in general.

back to town

Corniche Fountain

the eastern corniche

The swamps north to the main city is home to the region’s mangrove natural reserve, which is home to variety of wildlife such as birds. It is along the Corniche area where you can see natural occurring greenery on this part of the desert. You can have a go at the water sport centers lined along the water bodies here, such as jet sking, speed boating or just taking a simple swim. There are several Corniche broadwalks all lined along the perimeter of the city, with the prominent ones being the 8th street along the eastern ring road and the one along 1th street along the Corniche road towards Al Kjaleej Al Arabi Street.

Niffy Arabian bayside theming

the corniche park

iconic sail shaped tent

These mangroves and rivers separates the surrounding region in various “islands” which is what they are known as here too. Long bridges and interconnecting roads serves these islands from the main Adu Dhabi downtown area, usually as long overhead freeways spanning through the mangrove areas.

Situated at the western banks of Adu Dhabi, you will be able to catch the setting sun glowing over the blue horizon of the Persian gulf, with few distinct landmarks such as the Lulu Island, the Marina mall and Mina Dish market in the distance. The Mina market area is also home to the Iranian market and carpet souk, which is essentially a tourist trap and generally not recommended by the people here.

the food court

Arabian meaty foods!

fantastic fruit smoothie!

Adu Dhabi is home to a variety of the shopping malls and roadside hawkers server scattered all about the city. They all serve very affordable food, to that which even appeals to the locals and the workiing class here, so you know that you are not getting ripped off on a tourist deal. Most of the shopping centers here are rather commercialized with hypermarkets which is not in any way very different the the asian-western culture we have back at home.

We spend most of the night hanging around at one of the local malls by the central bus station, checking out on their local food for dinner as well as the Arabian produce such as their pastries and desert sweets.

Are we in Singapore?

Arabian sweets in the supermarkets

bus for our way back!

Surprisingly most of the stores here barely an uncanny resemblance to the stores back home. They even have Bata stores here to begin with. Aren’t these stores from Singapore as well? We caught the express bus back to Dubai again and thankfully, the highway traffic this time was so clear we made it back within the 2 hours with time to spare on the journey back.

What do you do on a nice sunny afternoon with an SUV and a huge desert in your backyard? Go on a desert safari of course. Our ride for the day will be a gag guzzling Toyota land cruiser manual, good thing fuel here is dirt cheap like water. The desert is rather unforgiving in nature and the sun and sands will be harsh, so it pays to pack in lots of gear such as liquids, food from one of the many roadside stores along your way to the desert. Cool desert gear is optional but recommended!

4×4 Wheels check!

Weird desert headgear check!

Digging the roll cage

The desert is not too far off the heart of Dubai, a short 30 minute drive eastbound after exiting the Dubai-Adu Dhabi freeway will bring you along the sand covered freeways which is typical of a desert road leading to a highway. There is nothing much to see here except just the road by your center and simply just sand dunes both left and right, with an occasional shrub or hill appearing in the middle of nowhere. The roads in some of the intersections are quite hard to see as well, not to mention the occasional sand blasted worn-out signboard.

Sky, sand, road

Oh there’s the road!

Rolling!

All the roads here are continuously blasted by sand, covering much of the road marking and even at times, burying the slip roads off the freeway, it pays to watch your speed around these corners as tires do handle very differently when you suddenly transition from road to sand and vice versa. Who knows sand can be so slippery! We were the first at the meeting point into the desert by the highway, waited about 15 minutes before the other 3 land cruisers in our convoy appeared, joining us in our trip. There were 4 land cruisers in total per convoy and you can always catch many other convoys in their own groups on the highway or hitting the sand in the distance too. After a tire pressure check and deflation, we are off and hitting the dunes of Dubai.

Hitting the dunes!

Sand Drifting!

Side sand kick!

A point land cruiser was chosen in the group, taking the point lead while the others follow pretty much in a train convoy manner. The point SUV has the responsibly to handle navigation to our next checkpoint, together with overcoming the harsh desert terrain all about us by taking the less dangerous slopes and tackle inclines negotiating steep slopes and warn of sudden drops and inclines with their brake lamps. All these in the light of safety of not possibly overturning our vehicle if we hit or tackle slops at an awkward angle.

Peace out

middle of nowhere!

Please topup $10,234.89 for desert roaming

Good thing our land cruiser comes equipped with a roll cage if the need arises. As an off-road freak, hitting and riding the dunes at speed almost like being on the Dakar rally. There were several planned rest points along our desert trail as planned by the point SUV, allowing guests to rest from the drive which can be rather nauseating to some passengers. As a side bonus, it seems that our point SUV does know the place very well, with all our vantage points being high ground desert scenic sights as well:

Reiterating my point of being literally in the middle of nowhere, in fact GPS is what runs almost the whole show here, despite the desert outlook. The lack of cloud cover here makes the connection and line of sight to any overhead satellites a breeze. Moreover, the desert wonderland here in Dubai is in fact rather well served by surrounding roads, if you ever get lost, just keep going straight in a random direction and you will hit a road under an hour.

to our night camp!

ATV bash!

Our desert oasis arabic camp

Just before night fall, we started navigating our way towards one of the commercial camp sites where we will be treated to a scrumptious dinner in no other better way offered than right in the middle of the desert. There are many other attractions to boot too such as sand duneboarding (dune snow-boarding) as well as ATV and camel rides, with the first 2 a chargeable extra. The camp, called the desert oasis itself is large, but minute in the vast desert it is built in, it is an installation sized about at least a 100 by 100m square.

camp overview

The camp centerpiece and dance floor

nicely themed

The campsite itself is a self sufficient little town decked and themed in an Arabian town, complete with wells and surrounding fortress walls, in a marketplace like atmosphere. Lined along the perimeter of the walls are various stores hawking Arabian ware, such as souvenirs and textiles, rather touristy. There are few interesting ones such as hernia tattoo booths and even an Arabian costume “try it on” area. The center piece of the oasis will be the central courtyard, where all the guest seating is located surround an open-air red carpeted central podium or stage where all the night performances are held.

Omftfg Camels?

Giddy yap!

In Arabian wear

This is a central sitting area, Arabian style, with low tables and no seats, almost like Japanese style traditional seating too if you can find something familiar to relate it to. Everything here is kept as close as authentic to the Arabian theme in the most commercially viable way as possible. We kept ourselves pretty much entertained with the camel rides out of the camp till it turned dark, as with health and safety protocols, even the camels here have to be muzzled!

bar with drinks on the house

Our BBQ for the night

hubbly-bubbly’s sweet!

All the drinks and food are on the house, which is technically paid for in the package which includes the vehicle for the desert safari. We literally spent the evening chilling out by the camp bar and trying out the hooka (hubbly-bubbly’s) before finding our way towards the central sitting area with our desert safari group. This is no of course filling up our plates with food from the buffet servery areas, with food all cooked openly on the BBQs by the camp site staff members. You can have a go at the BBQ yourself, but most of the guests there would rather leave the cooking to the staff and chow on the cooked food. All the BBQ food served is buffet style with unlimited servings.

BBQ and buffet dinner

bizzare food!

Yummy

There is quite a variety of main courses as well as desserts to go on the menu. An eccentric mix of western and Arabian cuisine was offered which will appeal to any western traveler without a drastic change in the choice of foods, if they so prefer more familiar or less spicy food like that back at home. For us Asians, it wasn’t much of an issue. Anyway what is a trip to the middle east without trying out their Arabian cuisines?

Getting a Henna paint

Viper!

Dancing performances

Everyone’s all at center stage enjoying their meals on the tables while the performance entertain guests with a series of musical performances and belly dancing. The “dance” floor or rather, mat will remain open after the performance for you to have a go at dancing with the performers and other guest alike, you can have a try at learning a thing or two about shaking your hips in belly dancing. Humorously, that is not a thing many guests can do after a huge multi-course buffet dinner.

Belly dance!

Free dance floor!

Hitting the dunes home

The place closes about 10pm-ish, where you can choose to leave in your groups for the convoy back to downtown Dubai, which is about less than an hour’s drive away. The desert at night is a complete pitch black, so it pays to drive with low beams only as an indicator to oncoming traffic without destroying much of your night vision, turning only to high beam if you see a dip on the dunes or when in doubt. You will be surprised with the lack of clouds in the desert, driving under the moonlight can be a surreal experience, with the whole desert decked in a soft blue. There are several convenience stores lined along the freeway on route back for you to pump your tires back up to road pressure, so do look for them on your journey back along the highway.

So that’s all for my trip to the desert safari, it was sun-blastingly fun!

This part of my Dubai trip focuses on the historical and heritage of the people here in the UAE. Places of interests here will be various heritage centers and museums of historical significance to the culture of the Dubai people. This experience is topped with a traditional Dhow river cruise down the Dubai creek right in the heart of Old Dubai.

at the Creek

Museum entrance

the main fort

First stop, the Dubai Museum! Located in the Al Fahidi Fort right in downtown Old Dubai, it is the oldest existing building in Dubai. The fort, built in 1787 features a front facade of cannons and is situated not far off the Dubai creek area. This creek itself is a major location for the gulf sea trade back in the early days of the town and even today. Having said that, acknowledging the contributions of the Dhow and the Creek of the early days, an iconic and distinctive full traditional Dhow can be seen on permanent display just outside the museum.

Upon entry to the museum courtyard, you will be greeted by a sand-filled little village, typical of the in Dubai during the early days and reflective of the lifestyle the people had at that time with living in the desert by the Creek.

can never fit!

surprisingly cool in sun

underground basement

Much of the displays and mock-up hut homes are exact replicas of the living conditions back then. Complete with soft beds and straw lined mats and walls. The wooden straw houses does a good job in keeping the glaring sun out, but not the heat, which seem to linger with the wind blowing through the area- which is uncomfortably all desert hot and dry and wicks aways any water in sight. The mud and clay houses on the other hand does a better job in insulation and keeping the heat out, on top of maintaining humidity at the expense of a darker and more earthy-damp smelling atmosphere. Some parts of the fort are air-conditioned display areas, showcasing pottery and various aspects of the upper fort in the early days.

You start the underground tour of the museum into the world of air-conditioned comfort from an entrance on the south-western corner of the fort. It’s from this single entrance here too, where you embark on the decent underground via a round spiral slope into a fishing port of the early world of Dubai.

needed air-conditioned comfort

interesting setups

stick teaching

Having said that, you will be brought through displays of early Old Dubai, particularly that through an Arabian marketplace, souks as well as the Creek side, where much trading over the Persian gulf was done then. There were accurate re-productions of food stalls decked with store owners, shipping merchants as well as the gulf traders which fueled the booming pearl trade then. Elaborating the displays are narrations and signages touching on the past developments and history of the Creek itself.

10,000 AED for the Camel?

Bounty loot!

Desert at night

The displays also provides a peek into the domestic life of the area, through societal and social interactions through villages, homes and schools alike. All decked out with mannequins and even animal replicas- showcasing an era long forgone all frozen and captured in time at the museum. There were few archaeological finds of the fort on display too, mainly early day pottery and cutlery used by the townsfolk.

Dhow boat construction

fishing, and pearl diving

Pots?

Besides cross gulf trade, fishing and pearl diving were also big things at the creek back then. Seasoned free divers search the sea for worthy oysters bearing good pearls of the trade. Often coming with bragging rights as the job is a respected and often high risk one, often yielding high gains to offset the risks involved- only the the best and fittest free-diving pearl divers having the luxury of finding the best loot under the sea.

Dhow boat building is an art too, with a strict set of workmanship procedures and standards in which the boats were produced back then. Dhows today are still in fact still constructed via the similar proven techniques as of the yesteryear, only with the current utilization of more modern and synthetic materials. This is done to prolong the active lifespan of the modern Dhow, yet retaining much of the iconic style, shape and handling of the boat.

prized archaeological displays

museum gift shop

gotta get used to beached boats

The displays then move further onto the traditional burial rites as well as the more prized archaeological displays particularly those in display in the Sheikh mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum hall. The tour through the whole museum is pretty much a linear one-way route and can be covered in about 2 hours the most, with the tour exiting right out of the museum and back onto the streets after passing-by the museum’s giftshop.

Bastakia!

Sprinkler pipelines

Got Wind?

Interestingly on this part of town, you can get few good scenes of the region-wide surface sprinkler system which I mentioned on my earlier blog post. These water carrying hoses runs under all the greenery here in Dubai, providing cooling and water to much needed vegetated areas. It’s nearly impossible for any vegetation here to thrive under the hot and dry climate of the middle east, thus the ingenuity of the underground watering system.

There are few markets around the area where the museum reside, particularly the Bastakia souks which is just a short walk through the buzzing town. Heading further north will bring you up to the Dubai creekside where we will be boarding our Dhow river cruise for the afternoon. The creekside is essentially a long paved walkway which runs along side the Dubai creek and is home to the Creekside Wind Tower Monument which is essentially a replica of the traditional cooling wind funnels used to in the traditional clay and mud houses here.

Dhow berthed by the Creekside

On the Dhow!

Cruising Cuisine

The creekside despite being a major port in the early days and a tourist attraction is surprisingly devoid of people in the day. It’s simply just to hot to get anything done out here in the day. Even most ships here across the gulf do much of their work and unloading here in the night which is surprisingly a much more bearable condition to work in. The daytime here by the creek is simply just too hot and literally just offers a lazy walk down the bayside. With that, the creekside is mostly all peacefully quiet with the breeze whistling past your ears and the faint smell of the heated brick floor and salt from the seawater. This silence of course broken with an occasional snoring fishermen on their Dhow boats and some traffic passing through the nearby roads.

All board!

The Rolex towers

not enough Yachts here?

The river is home to many Dhows and private Yachts all berthed alongside the Creekside. It seems that berthing on the southern banks are usually preferred by yacht owners and away from the busier northern banks, no telling how much does it cost to have your boat here for a day, but it shouldn’t be cheap. We started of the Dhow cruise by heading eastwards towards Port Saeed passing several iconic sights such as the Rolex Towers and the Al Bastakiya along the way, before making a U-turn and thereafter heading west towards the creek mouth towards the Dubai heritage center.

creek is buzzing with old and new

packed souk (market) area

by the Temple creekside

The view of the city from the creek itself puts you in the center of the spot, offering rather unique views you can never get from either end of the creek bankside. The boat carries on the tour through the creekside souks, allowing you to actually grasp the size of the marketplace and the density of the souk buildings packed so closely together- seemingly (and literally) packed denser and tighter than a can of sardines.

Places of interest here will include the spice and textile souks we visited the day before as well as the Lord Shiva Temple with it’s distinctive tall spires by the Creek river. The channel itself is home to huge number of Dhows particularly on the northern banks where the main market reside. In contrast to the southern banks where we broaded the cruise, the western channel is buzzing with life even on the hot midday.

River taxis

cloth souk

The Heritage center!

It’s also on this part on the west creek where you can spot many active water buses zipping across the creek, all of them packed to the brim with passengers. These water taxis, together with the larger mass-transport water ferries serve as the primary means of river crossing for the locals here, with the latter operated by the Baniyas Marine Transport Station.

While the larger ferries are fixed by departure timings, the smaller rengegade like river taxis operate independently with flexible departures depending on when their boats are able to take on any more passengers. These taxis operate both in the day and night, and riding on one of these is an experience itself. It’s almost literally crossing the creek on floats with an engine attached at no more of a bargain of 5AED a trip, safety line not included, just hang on!

old buildings and a creekside walk

open air amphitheaters

many points of interest

Our next stop on our historical tour will be the Dubai Heritage center, located on the southern banks of the creek just north of the textile souks. The heritage center spots a showcase of traditional Arabian housing, tents and mud houses alike all set in a small village atmosphere. The center moreover, is built alongside the creek with a creekside broadwalk to boot, complete with bayside restaurants, souvenir stores and cafes, which is not surprisingly devoid of any people at all. Maybe this place is more of a night hangout. There are few open air amphitheaters- nice, some college buildings and some pay-to-enter museums, but there is just nobody here at all, it’s just like a ghost town.

Sheikh Saeed Al Maktoum house

the house is a highlight

restoration work displays

Suited here along the Dubai Creek in the locality of Al Shindagha on the heritage center grounds is the Sheikh Saeed Al Maktoum house. It was established around 1894 as the seat of the Al Maktoum family and former residential quarters of Saeed bin Maktoum Al Maktoum, former ruler of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. The building is now a historic building and museum containing many historical Arabian artifacts as well as an extensive collection of images of old town Dubai.

loose bits!

subliminal Prince of Persia climbing urges

doors so small

The exhibits goes about as a showcase of the people, traditions, and history of the creekside. On display are some early drawn maps of the region, as well as traded currency, affiliations and trade agreements across the gulf. Notably those with Britain’s East India Company, which had established trading links with the Gulf as early as 1616. Miscellaneous displays include a peek into early day agriculture, development and architecture of the city, with some building fixtures preserved and laid within the compounds of the site itself, which are presumed to come from notable housing designs of the yesteryear.

Humorously, with the exception of the main entrance, the door and walkways of the house are extremely narrow, amusingly hobbit sized. Nested by the entrance is the museum’s general office, as well as a small cozy attraction giftshop.

wind towers work as natural AC

traditional Arabian jewellery

from the upper floors

The house itself spots a rather plain looking courtyard in the center with the compound buildings lined around and surrounding it. The general compound is made out of the traditional mud and clay decked with the iconic wind funnels on the roofs, keeping the estate cool in the hot summer months. These wind funnels here however are purely aesthetic and are non-functional now- they are all sealed and replaced with a more effective centralised air-conditioning which cools all the interior galleries in the entire museum. The upper level of the house is home to few rooms, a loft as well as a balcony offering an overlooking view of the Dubai creek looking eastward.

Okay, that is all for the historical sites in Dubai for now. The next part of my trip will be an exploration of Abu Dhabi!

The Burj Khalifa as of it’s inaugural year in 2010 is the world’s tallest building and tallest free standing man-made structure ever known to man. It was constructed over a period of about 3 years costing over US$1.5 billion with it’s primary contractor being Samsung C&T of South Korea and is developed by Emaar Properties. It stands at over 828m as preceded by the Taipei 101 and soon to be taken over by the 1600m tall Kingdom Tower skyscraper which is to be built at the nearby Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.

The Burj Khalifa

can never frame it whole in a photo

Yup, the right building

The main observation tower has no access from the grand entrance and is only open to residents. You start off by entering the building through the observation deck entrance at the Dubai mall basement. The entrance to the attraction is not too difficult to spot and is conveniently located by the food courts and flanked by an exit door to the Dubai fountain. Here is also where the attraction gift shop and ticketing counters reside. It is generally advisable to buy your tickets in advance upon your arrival in Dubai with your planned “flight time” just before sunset where it’s still bright. I went for a pre-booked 6pm flight off the counter. There, you can give about 30 minutes for the pre-flight showcase and displays before eventually making your way up. You will follow through a series of exhibited showcase about the conceptualization of the Burj Khalifa, the movers and pushers of the project as well as the technological challenges faced in designing and producing such a behemoth of a structure never built before.

As said, the main building itself was completed within 3 years of construction, with it’s ground breaking on the 21th of September 2004- A remarkable feat for a building that tall with technology we have today. In comparison, even the 5 floored Kings Chapel at my University in the United Kingdom took 20 years to complete in the 1446.

The front facade

and fountains

entrance to the tower

Upon entry to the welcome area, you will be greeted by a glass model of the the Burj Khalifa, all deck out in glowly white with facts and figures lined all round it. You will go through a series of friendly security checks and screenings before being led through more series of travelator and escalators with animated sideshows along the walkways.

Large numbers!

animated travelator showcase

Mmm twilight

There is a mix of audio and visual displays which carries on the length of the walkway and tunnel which brings you from the mall into the Burj Khalifa grounds itself. You will even come to a point with a skylight where you get to physically look up to the tower with a cross-hair targeted and pointing to the exact location of the observation deck on the building’s 124th floor. Thereafter various elaborate wall-projected text and flowery murals follows, as shown via high powered projectors, proceeding on with more of the building’s proud story, which in my opinion is cool, but don’t we already read all these on Wikipedia?

Showcasing the achievement

World domination!

Our observation deck

So as the story of the building told, it’s amazing what you can do with oil money, and it’s definitely not conceived on a typically good day where you just wake up with the feeling to just get the world’s tallest building built in your backyard using the few billions of loose change you have lying around the house.

Rather, the project underwent through a whole series of careful planning from various engineering perspectives given the challenges faced by the strong desert environments, such as the heat, sand storms and gale force winds at height. The project also saw the union of various specialists in the construction industry all over the world coming together. The tower’s architecture and engineering were performed by Skidmore, Owings and Merrill of Chicago, with Adrian Smith as chief architect, and Bill Baker as chief structural engineer.

The showcase is very well thought through and themed for an observation ride, even the elevator ride is an attraction by itself, all decked out with booming music to your ascend with animated LED lit walls. Have a go on the world’s fastest elevator transverse vertically at speeds up to 4 floors a second courtesy of lift maker Otis.

Going up the Burj Khalifa on the world’s fastest elevator:

There is no time limit to the duration you can spend up on the observation deck, in fact the place is so spacious and conducive, you could even spend the whole day up there if that didn’t bore you. One of the main reasons for going up at 6pm just like all observation decks I do around the world is that you can check out both the day and night views of the city for the price of a single trip. Also, what can be cooler than observing the city slowing transforming and lit into a sea of gold. Dubai is no exception either.

fastest elevators in the world

At the top!

Arabian Gulf in the distance

It’s from here where you can really appreciate the sheer height of the Burj Khalifa. Dubai is not known for their skyscrapers, and is a relatively new dog in the global skyscraper race in comparison particularly to the numbers we see in New York City, but for the city to jump from near zero to the world’s tallest is a huge undertaking, let be having the bragging rights to being the tallest (for now). There are literally no surrounding buildings even close to the height of the Khalifa, even tall buildings back on the ground look just like toys from the observation deck.

Panoramic View of the city of Dubai from just after sunset:

The observation deck spots ceiling-to-floor tempered glass windows and outdoor balcony viewing areas, all areas of the observation deck are all covered by barricaded glass walls with no ability for them to be opened. It is the outdoor areas of the observation deck where you can get a good look up towards the spire of the building, it’s just another mere 30 floors up to the top of the tower.

The gold glow of the city of Dubai at night note the golden expressways leading out into the horizon and Sheikh Zayed Road:

Just before 7pm, can just grasp the view of the setting sun over the horizon flanked by the Persian gulf. It’s then where the great city starts it’s slow transformation into a sea of night lights. The skyline view of the city of Dubai looks incredibly different in the night. It is from the decks too where you can catch and overhead view of the performing Dubai fountain every half and hour or so. You can just make out the blasts of water jets and the choreographed lights which fires up to 16 times a day during the mall opening hours.

sunlight 120 floors up

DEATH RAY GUNS!

open air viewing decks

Lined around the deck are rather interesting telescope thingies which I would like to call the death ray guns. These are optical argumented telescopes which overlays a heads up display on an LCD screen, so whenever you move the telescope around it shows you the names of the various attractions and landmarks around your telescope’s field of vision via a heads up display, each ray gun is unique with their own areas of interests. It’s not free though.

30 more floors to the pinnacle?

the performing Dubai Fountain

iconic golden Sheikh Zayed road

Up on the upper decks lives the attraction giftshop, offering a variety of Burj Khalifa themed merchandise you can take home or keep for your bragging rights up the world’s tallest building. Undecided on making a purchase up there only to regret not later? they saw that coming- there is an even bigger store back down on the ground floor with more goods of the trade.

golden highways into the distance

Burj Khalifa gift shop

Khalifa lit at night

From the outside, the tower is all decked out lit like a modern sliver spire with aviation warning lights flashing at every 30 floors all so, a sight to behold rising over the surrounding desert. In all, the Burj Khalifa itself is a huge achievement in terms of engineering what is technically not even possible decades ago, it is a show of human excellence in pushing the boundaries of today and tomorrow. However, the building is more or less just a trophy and somewhat doesn’t really live up from a practical point of view, let be sustainable. With Dubai mired in debt from this huge ambition during it’s construction, the government was forced to seek multibillion dollar bailouts from its oil rich neighbor Abu Dhabi. Therefore, in a surprise move at its opening ceremony, the tower was renamed from Burj Dubai to the Burj Khalifa, said to honour the UAE President Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan for his crucial support.

Having said that, the building is fast turning into a white elephant, with 823 of the 900 residential apartments still empty as of this point of writing. Nonetheless, till then the Burj Khalifa will still be a record breaker and still a sight to behold itself, despite the next tallest building in the world (Kingdom Tower) planned underway for construction at the nearby Saudi Arabia.

That’s all for the high life for now. Next up, sights in Dubai of the more historical kind!

No trip to Dubai is complete without spending a day at the Dubai Mall. Calling your mall establishment the “Dubai Mall” (Or the mall of the Dubai) does come with raised expectations of what to expect, being it to live up to it’s name as a “national mall” or sort. My day there begins back out into the sweltering heat of the outdoors for the journey to the mall after my regular morning dose of Arabic coffee in check. The mall shouldn’t be hard to spot, considering it being right beside the tallest structure in the city and the world.

nice day to visit the Dubai mall!

Morning coffee check!

transportation for the day!

There are many ways to get to the mall, the mall itself does free shuttle services from the main bus stations, other alternatives will include a taxi ride, which is generally recommended as the place is well served with a large boarding and alighting area by the mall’s hotel and it’s very easy to catch a cab anywhere in downtown Dubai. For today, my group decided to give the metro a full blunt try-out from the Burjuman complex

The rail network in Dubai is rather direct and plain simple with only a few major lines to boot branching out throughout the city from major interchanges such as the Khalid bin Al Waleed station where we boarded from.

Digging lights

overground

the red metro line

On the new Red line, the trains starts off from an underground station before seamlessly transitioning to an overhead viaduct alongside the Sheikh Zayed Road towards the Dubai-Abu Dhabi highway. The trains in question here are completely automated and driverless, a central nerve center HQ monitors all progress and positions of the trains with the aid of on-board cameras and GPS.

The metro itself is air conditioned, just like any other forms of public transport here. It is however, surprisingly not very popular yet with the locals with the exception of the Metro itself being pretty much a novelty item and an option to travel besides driving when going on trips with their families. Getting around all the public transport areas in Dubai require you to purchase a contactless smart card which charges a flat fee for bus trips and allow entrance and exit to the train stations itself (where the exact fares will be calculated).

Al Murooj area

inside the trains

metro experience get!

As of now, only the red and green lines of the metro system are operational, with 4 more extension lines coming out and planned from 2014 to 2020. The green line mainly served the north areas of Dubai, over the creek (Business bay) areas while the red serves the southern areas including all the shopping and financial districts of Dubai. The red line is the most major and popular line on the metro system, passing through many of Dubai’s main tourist spots as well as the Al Murooj area. I would like the emphasize that the names of some stations do not actually indicate the exact venue where the train stops. Taking the Dubai mall stop for instance, the metro stop itself is full unexpected kilometre walk away from the mall entrance, kinda like an urban planning fail.

Where is the Dubai mall?

Niffy!

the boutique shops

The Dubai mall was built at $20 US billion and undoubtedly too is the largest mall in the world. It shouldn’t take long before coming to glimpse with the large sand coloured structure. The Dubai mall’s fashion avenue is the mall’s flag ship area, which many high-end retailers all decked out in this area in the posh carpeted luxury, of course, no high end boutique is complete without the usual brands such as LV, Dior, Versace and Armani just to name a few. Thankfully not quite to my taste and budget!

too many indulgences!

real nicely themed stores

welcome to the avenue

The Dubai Mall itself and is surroundings are developed by Emaar Properties who also manages the Marina Mall and Gold & Diamond Park in the region. The place is so huge, it adds a whole new term to shopping exercise therapy. The mall mostly employs digital touch screen signages throughout the mall’s walkways to allow you quick store directory access, especially allowing you to do quick searches or looking up the retail genres of your interest at a touch. There are only a handful of traditional printed directories scattered around the mall if you wish to do a lookup the old fashioned way, but be prepared to do quite abit of searching and pacing around it, it is huge- after all that’s over 1200 stores listed to go through!

cool directories touch info panels

possibly the world’s largest store directory

Did I say STARS?

While most shopping centres spot the most one or two central atriums, the mall is so big, it is home to a huge number of large atriums, you will often get mixed if you do not notice the distinctive different theming each one has, some are decked with skylights and stary displays (star atrium) while some spots canvas and flags all laid around them (grand atrium). The mall itself is split into 5 unique themed areas, circling the gold souk located in the center which is intuitive to navigate. The only gripe being that you will be expected to take quite awhile to actually make a full loop back to where you’ve started, after all, we are talking about a 5.9 million square feet of a beast of a shopping mall!

the gold souk

essentially an upper class gold souk

all in air-conditioned comfort

The gold souk is a modern take of the traditional gold souk found in Old Dubai across the business bay by the creek side (as visited on days before). This version allows you to shop in air-conditioned comfort yet with the place typically set to that of the traditional Arabian gold souk found in the early days. Having said that, the marketplace is even heavily themed to the Arabian market theme, with lots of gold and blue trimmings along the walls adding to the lavish atmosphere with beckons shoppers in an setting of the rich and a place of plain indulgence.

The mall address

home to the Palace old town

every half hour fountain performances

The mall itself is not just limited to a huge floor area, the outdoor areas are also nicely endowed with you guessed it, more water features, a full man-made lagoon to be exact. It’s no ordinary lagoon though and is infact home to the Dubai fountain. It’s a dominant one and the fountain comes alive every 30-40 minutes, on the average of about 16 times a day during active opening periods. The fountain is a musical fountain, with music piped out to the bay area and choreographed to the lighting and water jets. The thing setting is one apart from most is the size of it, the fountain performance itself spans almost the whole width of the lagoon. The best time to experience the fountain is of course at night with the following photos and videos doing justice to it.

the Dubai Fountain

choreographed jets with music

Ending with spectacular tall water jets

The fountain water jets are rather impressive too, I am a fan of high powered water jet fountains, but no other musical fountain I’ve seen blasts away so many sky-high jets in unison and with such intensity as the Dubai fountain, a spectacle itself. Do check out the following video I’ve recorded of a performance, minding the wind noise and dinky video quality which is typical of the iPhone 3GS.

The Dubai Fountain:

Back indoors, the mall is also home to a 250-room luxury hotel, plus 120 restaurants and cafes. Plus going with the “bigger is better” tradition, the Dubai mall is also home to the largest indoor aquarium, with it’s own Guinness World Record to boot for the world’s “Largest Acrylic Panel”, standing at 33m wide, 8.3m and 0.75m thick. Behold, the Dubai Aquarium and Underwater zoo.

The place is not really much of a zoo and “underwater zoo” is the term which best describes the indoor zoo, despite most people here prefering to just calling it the “zoo” which can be pretty misleading. So when you are here, so don’t come here hopeful into looking for gazettes, polars bears, lions or tigers. Unless tiger or lion fishes are what you are looking for.

in the world’s largest mall…

The largest aquarium

Everybody love sharks!

You start off entering the aquarium and zoo through a walk into the “underwater” tunnel. This is the underwater tunnel section of the mall’s aquarium which is essentially and literally just a huge rectangular fish tank. Sad to say the tunnel is rather minutely endowed- it’s simply just a channel through the length of aquarium with the entrance and exit on both ends of the tank. It seemed that the aquarium was actually designed to be part of the free area in the mall, only with it barricaded and it’s the ends capped now with ticketing booths placed at the entrance so a fee could be charged to enter the tunnel.

head on in!

Short tunnel is short

Oh look sharkie!

In the tunnel, as with everything aquatic, you will be greeted with essentially a tunnel vision of the Dubai Aquarium tank. It is home to a variety of corals, harmless reef sharks, large school of fishes and even a whale shark to boot. The tank is themed to a shipwreck with several man-made barnacle ridden structures seen around the tank, giving it a rather weathered look. The resident whale shark is technically only impressive for it’s size but otherwise as harmless as a pet hamster. Occasionally, you can see divers on their fish feeding routines or park guests having a go at scuba diving assisted by divers in the tank, which will set you back about 200AED without the need for any form of prior scuba training or experience. Noticeably, most people will end up loitering in this section of the attraction, pacing the tunnel walkways which can be rather annoying at times.

Blury shark is blury!

healthy schools of fishes

this one escaped the tank!

Ironically there is a rainforest cafe located right at the exit of the tunnel which you will be led around with queue lines to a photo taking backdrop right beside the cafe which can be rather misleading, not to mention redundant. Why would I want to take a picture of this aquarium background if I’ve already taken over a million photos back there in the tunnel? Even so, a choice of a better background for the photo would be better.

The second part of the attraction brings you towards the upper floors of the mall, where the Dubai underwater zoo resides, which means exiting the aquarium section, heading back into the mall and finding your way up to the next venue. This is rather segmented in nature if the zoo was considered a part of the aquarium tour and attraction. However, finding the zoo for first timers is not that hard with the help of directories and a random friendly mall staff on the go.

aquarium and mini zoo right in the mall

Everyone loves piranhas!

you can’t get me!

The Dubai mall is not the only establishment in the region with an indoor zoo and the choice of have one indoors is not much an option in the withering desert heat of Dubai, given it’s climate. Therefore most such zoo attractions here are usually indoors. The one here in Dubai mall is no exception either. Situated on the cavernous upper floors of the mall (presumably where the cinema mega-flexes also reside) the attraction mimics the whole recreation of an equatorial tropical forest, complete with undergrowth, mangroves decked and complete with imported tropical wild life and fishes to boot. Even the air in the zoo seems to be climate controlled and feels humid given the abundance of water bodies around.

O rly?

Hi Ray! oh wait…

Lookie here!

Upon entry, you will be presented with a forest path to follow through various exhibits and information panels explaining about the displays in question, particularly the animals in captivity. The place is heavily themed and undoubtedly all man-made, most of the vegetation and flora is decked out in fibreglass, with ambient rainforest sounds played looping in the background to giving it an authentic undergrowth feel. The displays follow a rather linear route winding through the exhibits and passing through many tanks of fishes before moving onto the next. There is of course a limit to what most of the exhibits can be shown here, an doubtfully only fishes, with few notable ones such as piranas and playful otters.

There were many large freshwater fishes on display too, some native to the amazon as well as south east asia. Much of the lighting here in the “rainforest” is simulated with no skylights in sight, which can be rather misleading to the animals as whole.

Lazy bums

jellyfishes

Mmm yummy crabs…

The displays range from freshwater fishes (the arher fishes are really cool with “targets” specially set up for them to “shoot”) to a shark tank comprising of small reef sharks, there’s even a tank fully of jellyfishes which glows under synthetic florescent lighting and well as few relatively exotic crustaceans such as Alaskan crabs. There is no telling how much these crabs can fetch on a dinner table. The deep sea areas of the zoo are nicely themed with waterfalls and fiberglass cave walls, giving it a divine atmosphere, but everything around still looks rather simulated which is as far as the theming can go in balance for practicality in a recreated atmosphere.

overhead pool access and maintenance area

Rawr human! feed me!

Roaches

Following the route, you will eventually come to a part of the path where you can have an overhead and bird eye’s view of the huge mall aquarium downstairs. This area, decked with PADI posters and scuba gear is also the access areas to the mall’s “Dive with the sharks” attraction as well as the maintenance section of the aquarium with the pool’s lighting, filtration and pump systems in full view, used to maintain the aquarium’s quality, such as salinity and hygiene.

There is also a creepy crawly section, home to a various range of bugs, with the scorpions and tarantulas (being my favourite). The section is small and too bad the zoo didn’t have much of an arachnid handling area, let be a petting pool in the aquatic sections, otherwise that will rock.

a bridge too far

playful penguins

Emperor penguins, lazy bums

The creepy clawy section of the zoo is neatly tucked on the upper decks of the attraction, which is only accesible via a staircase where most of the time will go unnoticed, here also resides the reptile section of the zoo with some lizards on display. There is also a mini rope suspension bridge up there which forms the rainforest “canopy walk” part of the park, allowing you to have an overview of the rainforest portions of the park you’ve previously been through, otherwise, it’s just a fancy overhead playground with nothing much on display. Back in the deep sea and ocean areas, the Emperor penguins exhibit was a delight and one of my personal favourites, able to get up close to them by the window and catching them swimming around the pool was both entertaining and amusing at some points.

Seeing more stars!

twitlight part of the mall

Megaplexes are synonymous with large malls

The zoo is not just what’s on the “interesting list” in the mall, the place is also home to few nicely theme megastores, hypermarkets, an awesome Froyo store as well as the SEGA Republic indoor theme park. The Sega Republic is a theme park and arcade decked complete with everything Sega together with indoor amusement rides spanning two full elevated floors. Moreover, no megamall is complete without it’s multi theatre cinema mega-flexes too, the Reel Cinemas here is no exception with 22 mega cinema screens to boot.

an arcade!

various flat rides and a dark coaster to boot too!

interesting themed stores

A large multi purpose ice rink (called the Dubai Ice Rink) resides in one of the mall’s giant atrium as well, which can be used for ice hockey matches as well as a skating performance or as how it spends most of it’s active life- as a recreational public ice-skating rink. The ice is very smooth and resurfaced daily. Last but not least, situated at the waterfall atrium is the amazing Dubai waterfall, spanning the height of the full 4 floors of the mall complete with silver surfer styled diving statues attached to the walls by their groins, amusingly designed by DPA architects.

indoor skating rink

The Dubai waterfall

where I left my ride?

The Dubai mall is definitely a place to spend a whole day in, it itself is a behemoth by itself decked with stores, food and attractions to suit interests for all age groups. It’s a good thing that despite in all the lush luxurious glamorous which surrounds the theme of the Dubai Mall, most of the stores here are still catered to the masses and a wide range of consumer budget including the general working class. It is, after all a mall catered for the people masses at heart.

That’s all for the Dubai mall for now, next stop will be up the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa itself.