Dubai, UAE

Greetings from the desert!

We caught an overnight flight from Shanghai and arrived in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on Easter morning.

View from the plane's window.

Easter morning in the Abu Dhabi airport waiting for our bus to Dubai. We managed to find a really good breakfast place and had time for a nice meal.

We found chocolate easter eggs!

The Burj Khalifa - the world's tallest building.  At 2,700 feet tall, it is difficult to frame the entire building in a photo from most anywhere in downtown Dubai.  The building is a true masterpiece - more like a work of art than a structure.  You hear the phrase "pierces the sky", and it truly does.



Dubai reminded us quite a bit of Las Vegas.  Over the top extravagance in the desert but without the gambling, no seediness, and a lot less alcohol.

Dinner from a cafe by the downtown fountain and the Burj.

If the Dubai fountains could talk, they'd say how cute they think the fountains at the Bellagio in Las Vegas are.

The Emirates shopping mall contains the world's only indoor ski resort - Ski Dubai.  We couldn't wait to get back on the slopes!!!

Lift ticket line.

A few unexpected pleasant surprises. 
1.  It was very cold - about 20 degrees.  (100 degrees outside.) 
2.  The man made snow was awesome - excellent for carving turns.
3.  The resort had a mid mountain cafe.  The Avalanche Cafe serves yummy hot chocolate with marshmallows, whipped cream and M&M's!!  The midmountan cafe is about 100 feet from the base of the mountain.
4.  The double chair serves the intermediate run but they also have a poma lift for the expert run.

Suited up and ready to go!  We never stopped smiling.

This is the bottom 2/3 of the mountain. The other 1/3 is around the bend at the top left.

The Avalanche cafe below.

Riding high at Ski Dubai.  The world's slowest chairlift!

We haven't been buying too many souvenirs on our travels, but I left here with a Ski Dubai cap, Ski Dubai t-shirt and a Ski Dubai sticker.  Not sure where I'll stick it.

After a morning of skiing, we found a Lebanese restaurant in the mall overlooking the slopes!

We stayed at another Airbnb apartment in Dubai - 43rd floor downtown (low by Dubai standards) with views of the skyline and fountain.

Always a little dust in the air.

We continued our quest to visit the tallest buildings as we traveled.  After skiing we headed over to the Burj Khalifa for a sunset visit.  Carol had to reserve our tickets a few months in advance.

148th floor

From the world's highest outdoor observation platform - the "highest high five"!

Downtown sculpture.

Shopping in Dubai. You can see the inspiration for the sculpture.

One morning we visited the Sheikh Mohammed Centre for Cultural Understanding.  We learned quite a bit about the Islamic Culture and Religion.  We enjoyed some of their traditional food and drink - dates, arabic coffee and other sweet treats.  

 Wearing the traditional head scarf for our mosque visit.

The mosque had a display with the daily prayer times lit up and listed - each changes by one minute every day.

Down a side street near the mosque in the historic section of Dubai.

Outside the mosque - buying a traditional "Batula" (sunscreen).

This traveler spends a few months a year living in his tent outside the mosque with his falcon.  The remainder of the year he lives in Yemen.

One of our craziest adventures so far was an afternoon of "dune bashing" in the desert - about an hour outside of Dubai.  Our Airbnb host highly recommended the tour and graciously signed us up as we checked in to our apartment.  He took our credit card, charged the trip, and said a white SUV will be here on Thursday to pick us up at 3.  We had zero details about where we were going, what we'd be doing, or who would be picking us up.  The sign on the car let us know we'd be traveling with "Trusty Tourism".   So we felt we had made a good decision.  After all, they were trustworthy.  We left the city with our driver, Ahmed, and three Russian tourists packed into the SUV equipped with a roll bar and a malfunctioning seat belt.

First stop on the excursion was a quad bike ride in the desert.  Cameron signed on and had a blast.

Then it all got a bit wild.  Ahmed pulled out into the desert with about a dozen more white SUV's.  He got out and handed Allison a plastic bag and told her to use it if she had to vomit.  He turned up the Arabic hip hop music to "10" and took off into the dunes.  We rolled and climbed the dunes at a very high rate of speed - it felt at times as if we were on two wheels.  The sand was blasting over the side windows and windshield as we careened off one dune to another.  All the while, our driver Ahmed, was on his phone texting!

I don't have video or photos of the ride because it would have been physically impossible to hold on to a camera.  All of our effort and strength were spent on holding on to the car handles and belts.  And by the way, Allison's lap belt didn't work.

Ahmed at the wheel.

After about a 30 or 40 minute roller coaster ride through the dunes outside Dubai, Ahmed stopped so that we could take photos and take in the scenery.  

Ahmed with the kids - all smiles after the dune bashing was over.

Cooling off the engine after the ride.  Scattered all around the dunes are SUV bumpers.

After the dune bashing we were taken to a desert camp for dinner and entertainment.  

Camel rides!

The camp scene, just in time for sunset.  Notice all of the white SUV's in the background.

Desert entertainment - fire eating and belly dancing!

Driving home, I was surprised to see 100's of white SUV's blasting back on the highway toward Dubai.  I asked Ahmed how many SUV's head out every afternoon to the desert for dune bashing.  He replied "about 1,000".  On the return trip, they all stop at the same service station to inflate their tires with air.  The station has about twenty air hoses - and the SUV's are lined up five deep.   Coincidentally the shop has lots of souvenirs to browse while you wait for the tires to get inflated.  We made it safely back to our apartment in Dubai and ordered a very late dinner in - we didn't have much of an appetite at the desert camp earlier in the evening!

Our last night in Dubai, we visited the Dubai marina and coast. 

Dinner with a view of the Burj Al Arab - one more taste of impressive architecture.

Our huge plane waiting to take us to our next destination - London!

China - Shanghai

The last two days of our China visit were spent in Shanghai.  The skyline, the crowds, and the development are all staggering and very exciting!  We cut away from our tour group for both days in Shanghai and explored on our own.  It was nice to be back at our pace and creating our own schedule.

Our first evening we took a river boat ride viewing the skyline of Shanghai.  

The Chinese light up all of their skyscrapers at night which makes for an impressive sight - to say the least!

As we have traveled, we continue to visit the tallest buildings along the way.  In Santiago, we went to the top of the tallest building in South America.  In Auckland, the tallest in New Zealand.  In Melbourne we visited the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere.  And here we went to the top of the Shanghai Tower which is the tallest building in China and the second tallest building in the world.  In just two days we'll be in Dubai and we will visit the Burj Khalifa - the tallest building in the world.

We loved the curves on this building.

Although it was a sunny day, notice the smog and haze.  The Chinese smog you read about is always hanging in the air.  This made us very grateful for our Environmental Protection Agency in the US.  Hopefully that agency still exists when we return!

The view from the top

The Shanghai World Financial Center

Cameron was excited to visit the Apple Store in Shanghai.  Notice the Apple logo on the glass sphere leading down the spiral stairs to the underground store.  Fantastic!

Apple store entrance with Shanghai Tower behind

Our second night in Shanghai we were entertained by the Chinese Acrobats.  Awesome!!

This was like a flexible balance beam. The guy on top was launched high into the air and landed back on the beam.

One afternoon we visited the Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Hall.   It contained a three dimensional model of the entire city - photo below.  I would highly recommend a visit if you are in Shanghai!  The Chinese have a very interesting approach to urban planning.  They have the funds to get projects done and of course the government can just move forward without any opposition or roadblocks - for better or for worse.

Though the city is huge, people work in their own neighborhoods. 

Street scenes from around the city:

Notice the power lines. It is amazing the electricity keeps flowing. This type of wiring wasn't limited to Shanghai. We saw it in every city we visited in China.

The Bund is a wide walkway running along the West bank of the Huangpu River with views over to the Pudong skyline on the East bank.  Up until the 1990's, Pudong was a sleepy suburb of Shanghai and now has one of the most impressive skylines in the world!

The Bund

Pudong skyline

We have loved every day of our time in China.  The country and culture are so vast and impressive. So much to learn and so much to see.  I'm sure we'll be back again to experience more!

Next stop: Dubai!