Blogs from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Middle East - page 24

The do's and don'ts when in Dubai and it's Ramadan...(in no way linked in any religious manner and certainly and sincerely not meant to offend anyone who observes Ramadan): 1. Don't run around in the heat of the day. Doesn’t only apply to Ramadan, I know. 2. Don’t expect to be able to eat and drink in public places. 3. Very few restaurants and coffee shops will be open during the day (relative to no 2). 4. Don't expect alcohol to be readily available during Ramadan; even after sundown. 5. It is also frowned upon to swear, argue and procrastinate and one should be kind and considerate to people. 6. Don’t be surprised if you get cold! Now you’ll laugh and think I’m crazy! Having left Phuket and Phi Phi behind us, it was time to ... read more

Back in November 2013, i was already planning for first holiday of 2014 and Dubai came up as something feasible - both from time and cost standpoint. I searched more and made up my mind that its the Oasis in Gulf that we will visit in Feb, just after their DSF event in Jan.Just as we were abt to book logistcs, we felt like checking with few close relatives and we did with both Kaka's and to our delight, Prakash kaka agreed to join us.I booked logistics. Air fare specially b'use i was booking 2 months in advance turn out to be really cheap..approx INR 11k per person return from Mumbai on Indigo direct flight.The savings that we made there, we invested in our stay by booking a really good hotel apartments near to tourist places ... read more

The time had come: vacation was over. In a way, I was a little relieved. Part of that was helped along by looking forward to another fantastic flight in Business Class on the Emirates A380. I had the option of having a car sent to get me by Emirates, but you had to booked 48hrs ahead of time; I just missed it at about 42 hours - grrr.... Oh well. Instead, our hotel booked a car for me - I had asked for a taxi and they said it would be $65 to give to the driver; expensive but fine as long as it was taken care of. When my driver came, it weren't no taxi! It was a black Cadillac Escalade. Not too shabby! He drove me through Queens to JFK on a smooth, uneventful ... read more

Well here we are again just about to start another long journey and feeling really excited about setting off again. We so enjoy departing for new countries and meeting ‘new’ friends along the way. Even after four years of ‘living out of suitcases’ we still love travelling but miss our family and ‘old’ friends but it is always good to catch up with them again when we can. PROBLEM LEAVING SOUTH AFRICA In our last blog we were just about to leave Cape Town, South Africa having enjoyed travelling around nine countries in three months but we unfortunately left the country on a very sour note! We were stopped at Passport Control as we had overstayed our Visa and we were told that we had to pay a fine. We had unintentionally overstayed the 90 day ... read more

A bright early start saw us at the airport well in time for kick off and leaving the bright sunny shores of New Zealand for the eastern city of Dubai. As is usual with us, leaving home is never without its dramas be they small or large. This time we scored some very cheap duty free booze at DFS, one bottle of scotch I took with us for those little night caps so important on any trip, leaving the other three bottles (not all scotch by the way) to collect on our way home. Arriving for our short stopover in Melbourne the anal retentive Aussie customs would not let me take through my bottle as they said it was not in a sealed bag, duh, how daft are they, we were not even going in to ... read more