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We also visited the world market Global Village, part of the Dubai Shopping Festival. This is a huge shopping/theme park about an hour outside Dubai that can best be compared to the Epcot Center, but with much more of an emphasis on shopping. Each section of the park is divided by country, ... (read more →)
The Bur Dubai Souq, across from Deira and right next to the abra station (this is where the boats drop you off when you cross the creek) had some of the best deals we saw in Dubai. Lots of knockoff watches, handbags, as well as beautiful textiles, rugs at rock bottom prices (after haggling). ... (read more →)
Another mall we checked out was the Ibn Battuta mall. This mall is at the far end of New Dubai, so was a little costly in a cab to get to. It was worth it however, and was for our money the most unique shopping mall we visited in Dubai. Every wing ... (read more →)
Ski Dubai and the Mall of the Emirates is another must-see in Dubai. Despite being Canadian, we’d never actually been downhill skiing, but why not start in Dubai? Attached to the shopping mall, Ski Dubai is a massive indoor structure, 60 stories high, with some impressively good slopes.
The whole Ski Dubai experience is ... (read more →)
Right beside the Burj Al Arab is Souq Madinat Jumeirah. This is a high-end shopping mall/”souk”, which is the cleaned-up, high price version of the souks elsewhere in the city. This is more of a tourist trap than a legitimate place to get a good deal on souvenirs. That said, we did ... (read more →)
We opted instead for viewing the outside from the public beach, about a 20 minute walk away. The hotel is surrounded by beautiful beaches, but all the ones close by are exclusively for use by hotel guests. The public beach was a nice long stretch of sand, and if we had our swimsuits, ... (read more →)
One of the “must-see” for any visit to Dubai is the Burj al Arab, a beautiful tall modern hotel in the “New Downtown” of Dubai. It is a six star hotel and costs a ridiculous amount of money to stay there per day. Unfortunately, to get in costs $65 US per person just to ... (read more →)
Our next destination was Sharjah. Shajarh is actually another emirate, not too far from Dubai, but there are no highways and it is non-stop city. Without traffic, it would probably take only a quarter of an hour to get there, but traffic made it closer to an hour. We took a bus to ... (read more →)
Our driver took us back to the hotel, where we waited for our second tour, the evening/night tour. The second tour (Starlight Express ) started on time and, although we were worried about the idea of combining two of their tours, it worked quite well. The new guide we had was a ... (read more →)
On the way back from the dunes, we stopped at the Rainbow Sheikh’s Car Museum. Though not officially open to the public yet, a security guard offered to let us in. It’s a huge warehouse with the Sheikh’s car collection, complete with what is probably he largest truck in the world. His ... (read more →)
The next morning, we started our safari with Arabian Adventures. The first tour we took, A Day in the Dunes (http://www.arabian-adventures.com/ToursSafaris/AbuDhabi/Safaris/DayDunes/DayDunes.Asp?nav=2⊂=2)
, started at 9am, allowing us to enjoy a wonderful buffet breakfast at the hotel’s restaurant (included in the price of the room).
We were the only ones in the vehicle, and I believe ... (read more →)
Afterwards we headed to the Corniche. This is a recently redeveloped waterfront area, and the subject of some controversy, as they had to demolish an older area of town to make room for it. From what we saw, it was a very pleasant area to stroll, next to the sea. It was ... (read more →)
We only had one evening in Abu Dhabi, so we headed out to find some food.
There were 2 restaurants nearby that both sounded good. The first, a Chinese place called Royal Orchid, turned out to be closed, but looked quite good. Our second choice, just a little further up As Salem St., ... (read more →)
It was surprising to us that we had such a hard time, given that we were staying at a major hotel right downtown – the International Rotana Inn. The hotel was very well located – about a 10 minute walk from the corniche. The hotel had mixed reviews on the internet, but it far ... (read more →)
From our hotel in Deira, we picked up our bags, crossed the Dubai Creek by dhow (10 cents), and from there it was about a 15 minute walk to the bus station. The bus station was easy to figure out (everyone speaks English, and everything is clearly labelled) and we were soon on the next ... (read more →)
The next morning we headed out to explore Deira. We started out wandering through the electronics market. Nothing very exciting – prices were similar to or worse than what we can get in the US.
It wasn’t long before we moved on to the Gold Market. There are more than 700 shops here, crammed with all ... (read more →)
We had arranged through Expedia.com our first night at Le Meridien Baniyas Square. Le Meridien is a fairly high end chain. They have several expensive hotels in Dubai, but they also have one cheap location (”Baniyas Square”) in the Deira district (close to a lot of Dubai’s top tourist attractions). The rate was only $70 ... (read more →)
We booked our tickets relatively late, and as such, didn’t have much luck finding reasonable fares online. We ended up using a discount Asian travel agent/consolidator called Dada Tours, based in Los Angeles. The San Francisco to Dubai route is often used by Pakastanis trying to get home. The travel agent beat ... (read more →)
My wife and I took a two week trip in December 2006 to visit the UAE (United Arab Emirates), and Oman.
