Day 39 - Hatta - Dubai We left Dubai and the Arabian Ranches this morning and drove to Hatta. We picked up our rental car yesterday from the Emirates Mall. We ended up with a Thrifty car as the Hertz car was going to cost us $100 NZ more to rent. The trip to Hatta was very interesting, as it was quite windy so there was a little bit of dust and sand blowing about. It was also very hazy. We drove out of the built up areas of Dubai into the desert. It seemed strange driving through the desert on [View Full Entry]

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Day 38 - Our last day in Dubai before we head to Hatta for a few days then we start the journey home. This morning we headed out to the Bur Dubai, so that Chelle could pick up the clothes she has had made at the Tailors. The Burj is a crazy place for traffic, and also very difficult to find somewhere to park. Chelle pulled into a dusty vacant lot, double parked, jumped out of the truck and said to her Dad ‘just shift the truck around if you need to!!!!’ There were cars, trucks, vans, buses all coming and [View Full Entry]

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Day 37 - Dubai Today has been a very quiet day, just mooching around the Ranches. We all needed a day like today as the rest of the holiday has been at a very frenetic pace. Graham and Chelle went for a 10km walk this morning around the Ranches to the Supermarket. They came home a little hot and bothered so to the pool Graham went to cool off. Chelle thought it was too cold to swim at this time of the year. It is winter after all in Dubai!!!! Tomorrow is our last day in Dubai before we head off [View Full Entry]

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Day 36 - Dubai Mall - New Years Day - 2009 This newly opened Mall is at Burj- Dubai and it is so large that people get lost in it and cannot find their cars. They have special security people to help the customers find their cars. Chelle and I had already been there before Xmas but Graham hadn’t so Chelle wanted to show him the aquarium. Graham was suitably impressed, in fact he was stunned by the size of the Mall and the opulence of it. Chelle wanted to buy a book, so she took us into a bookstore, that [View Full Entry]

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Day 35 - New Years Eve in Dubai, and all entertainments have been cancelled by the Ruler of Dubai because of the plight of the Palestinians in ‘The Gaza’ and the war Israel is waging against them. It is really of no consequence for us as we are still tired from our Syrian holiday and we were going to have an early night anyway. We have had a lovely day today, the weather has been beautiful as usual. This is a really good time to visit Dubai as it is winter so the weather is dry and sunny and the temperatures [View Full Entry]

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Day 34 - We are in Dubai for the next four days, and I have to say these days will be very beneficial as we were very tired when we arrived back from Syria. I think we were surviving on nervous energy a lot of the time in Syria and that indeed makes one a little tired. Travelling in Syria was wonderful, and as I have said ‘the people were just lovely to us.’ In saying that we only saw one other European couple in the Aleppo Souk. Syria was what you would call unpredictable, you never quite knew what may [View Full Entry]

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Days 32 and 33 - We are chilling out in Dubai at Villa 15, Palmyra 3, Arabian Ranches. The weather has been beautiful with temperatures in the mid 20,s and no wind. I walked around to the supermarket (45 minutes each way) to buy some victuals and Sandy caught up with the washing accumulated from a month on the move. The Villa at Arabian Ranches is in a lovely location with a lake over the back fence and a swimming pool just down the road. It is an ideal location for families with young children. The streets are isolated with a [View Full Entry]

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Day 31 - Last night really ‘took the cake’ in experiences of hotels in Syria. We were rudely awoken at 10.30pm by extremely loud Arabic music. One has to hear Arabic music to understand that loud Arabic music is not a very pleasant experience. Graham tried to ring reception to see what was happening but they wouldn’t answer the phone. So we made the best of it and tried to go back to sleep. Suddenly there was a loud bang on our door. When Graham opened the door Chelle was there yelling above the noise that she had been downstairs and [View Full Entry]

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Day 30 saw us leave Hama for Homs. Hama was extremely interesting, we were staying at the Cham Palace Hotel. Once again we were the only guests at the hotel. They didn’t know what to do with us for dinner and it was Xmas Day!!!! We ended up having an omelette yet again. Breakfast was even more interesting, out came the olives, humus, cabbage etc. I had asked for cereal and that is what they perceived as cereal. I ended up having cornflakes, water and banana. I wasn’t that impressed by it all I must say. We went for a lovely [View Full Entry]

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Day 29 Today we woke up to Xmas day in the Sheraton Hotel. It was a lovely hotel and all was very normal in the hotel which was quite a change for us on this holiday in Syria. We had a lovely pre - Xmas Dinner in the Italian restaurant at the Sheraton on Xmas Eve. I have to talk about a funny thing that happened to us at the Souk yesterday. We were discussing price with one of the stall holders when he suddenly said to us “do you speak English” I said “ I am English” he looked at [View Full Entry]

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