October 12th, 2006 Dubai, United Arab Emirates

October 12, 2006
Dubai, UAE

Last night after we had finished on the internet we headed back to our house. On the way we saw a street vendor selling bootleg DVD's and decided to try one out (since we have a DVD player in our room). We selected a 5-in-1 DVD containing Clerks 2 and Lucky Number Slevin for 10 Durhams ($3).

Once back at the hotel we decided to go for an evening swim on the rooftop pool. Even though the water was about 90 degrees, it was very refreshing. After our dip we went back to the room and put in our movie. As we selected the movie to watch on the DVD we found that the only movie that actually worked was Lucky Number Slevin. After watching it for 30 minutes the movie ended (much to our disappointment)…I then listened to my iPod and finished Harry Potter 6: The Half-Blood Prince (anyone interested in talking HP theory just send me an email…)

This morning we slept in longer later than any other day on the trip (13:00). Upon awakening we headed down to the lobby and paid for a Desert Safari for this afternoon. We then visited the pool and workout room. After a quick lunch we headed back down to the lobby to head to wait for our Safari to leave.

At 16:00 the Safari driver came and picked us up. He was by far the craziest driver I have ever seen! I swear we almost got into 5 accidents on our way to the desert…still, we survived! We were accompanied in our vehicle by an older couple from New Zealand and a family from England (their son Junior was super cute).

After a quick stop to take some pictures and let the air out of tires of our vehicle (Land Cruiser) we went for a ride on the dunes. We drove up, down, and around the sand mountains. It was a wild ride!

The drive through the dunes ended at a camel farm. We had about 10 minutes to go pet the camels. As the sun was setting we made our way to a desert outpost where we stayed for the remainder of the evening.

The first thing B and I did was get henna tattoos. We then wandered through a couple of the shops (there were only 2) and looked at some of the overpriced tourist items. We sampled some Arabic tea (which was amazing!) and headed toward the camels. B and I then took a camel ride around the outpost.


Upon returning to the encampment we dawned some local clothing. It felt super cool to be wearing what the locals wear. I might have to purchase the apparel…

As we waited for our food we played around with Junior. He enjoyed crawling under the table and pretending he was a monster.

The dinner was incredible. Everything on my plate tasted amazing (I included a picture just for you Mom!). I don't really know what any of it was so forgive me for not describing it more…Just know that it tasted good and had a little bit of spice.

After dinner we returned to our vehicles and headed home. Apparently there is usually a belly-dancing show that we missed out on because it is Ramadan. The drive back was just as crazy as the drive there. Our driver had a serious case of road rage and felt the need to honk at every car that was in front of us.

We are both extremely tired from the afternoons adventure and plan on heading to bed fairy early. Tomorrow morning we are heading out on a tour of the city.

PS - Welcome to my Blog April! I am glad that you finally started reading it :). Please send me some of those pictures you have of you and I and Pete!