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Published: October 9th 2019
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It’s always good to have a plan. Let’s go to Katara Village, see the sights, the works of art, the bird houses and the amphitheater then get the taxi to take us the long way home via Pearl Island, along the Pearl Boulevard, around the man made islands, the Venetian Canal and the Oyster. Good plan. But even with a map to show the driver where we wanted to go all he heard was ‘Souq Waqif’ (our final destination) and off he went. Very efficient but in the wrong direction. So pleased with himself for understanding English and happy to get us there in good time but...
There are some shots from Katara and it’s a good idea place. Sort of a home for traditional arts and crafts and a display space for artists, particularly sculptures. The arts and crafts places didn’t look particularly inviting and rather than display traditional skills I think it may have been there to teach them and hence be a little more private than I imagined. There was a cafe and restaurant cult there as well that looked good but quite upmarket but we were there early, that is late afternoon and before there was
in any kind of action. There remained a deal of infrastructure from the recent games here and tents, lighting and seating lined what must have been the marathon course and the beaches were still set up for beach volleyball and beach football.
Again very impressed by the Doha skyline. The design of the buildings is very impressive and rarely do you see the concrete rectangular prism that we have become accustomed to. Certainly it is a modern city already but there is dramatic construction still occurring that will see this place become even more striking and even more impressive in the near future. All over Doha are signs announcing and trumpeting their 2030 plan so things are moving. We are in the older part of town, our first driver showed us a few of the big international hotels, and there are plenty, but there are precincts here for medicine, industry and eduction. The one I like best though is the ‘Aspire’ zone. There is a golf club but it would be tough to play in these conditions! But the Qataris may be working on that! They have an air conditioned stadium ready for the World Cup and they already
have an air conditioned street. An uncovered street that is completely air conditioned! Yes, because they can.
Next plan is to get Lee moving for evening meal. She hasn’t eaten a lot today so,it’s looking good. There’s a Lebanese place that looks good and should not be too bread based enabling Lee some choice. There are heaps of places here but few in the cheap category unless you choose a cart stand rather than a sit down restaurant. I’ve eaten cart and they are good but we will see. It seems as if here in Doha they have make a conscious choice to up market themselves. Tours in particular seem inordinately expensive and I think they work on the basis of 3 or 4 in 10 paying a heap rather than everyone paying a good deal less. I’ve not met anyone who has had a group tour of say 5 or 6 people instead it’s either 1or 2 as a private tour or miss out. I asked to put my name down hoping to find others but it was scribbled on a piece of scrap paper and obviously not looked at again. The restaurants seem a bit the same,
all clambering to go more and more up market and starting to exclude some maybe customers.
Anyway that‘s plan C.
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