Abu Dhabi & Dubai- Days 4- From Modern Kayaks to Old-Fashioned Abras

The Abu Dhabi area is actually full of islands (it is a coast line…) so despite being a desert region, there is water and plenty of water sports.  We got up early on Sunday morning and went kayaking through the mangroves which was very peaceful and probably the opposite of what most people do when they come!  Saw some herons, crabs, etc and really it reminded us a lot of South Carolina and Florida, which was just comical.

It was nice to get out and do something different though before hopping into the car and driving up to Dubai. It’s about an hour and fifteen between the two cities, and really easy by car as it is a straight shot.  The most challenging part of driving is really just in Dubai as it has one major highway up the middle and then a million over passes, under passes and interchanges branching off of it. Totally doable but can be a little challenging if you make a wrong move to recoverJ  Driving in we got our first glimpse of the Burj Khalifa, currently the tallest building in the world and looks like a needle reaching for the sky.  The way Dubai has been built up, all along the major highway are skyscrapers but then on the water side and the desert side, everything else is short.

We checked in at the Conrad and after checking out the waterview, headed over to lunch at a great Middle Eastern restaurant called Zaroob.  Really funky décor and amazing casual food, this might have been one of our favorite meals of the trip (and it’s when my addiction to labneh really kicked up a notch). 

Next we drove over to the Heritage Village, dropped the car, walked around there a bit and then continued along Dubai Creek to the textile souk.  Definitely very tchotchke, but it’s a souk with barkers and it would be weird to not at least walk through. We headed over the Dubai Museum next, which is in Dubai’s restored fort, then wandered more of the Bastakia Quarter, which is just narrow lanes, etc.

It was getting really hot at this point, but it worked out perfectly that it was time to catch an abra (basically an old water taxi) across the creek to check out the spice and gold souks.  Totally overwhelming for their sheer size, we ended up wandering through but only picking up a few spices on our way out.

Headed out to dinner at Toko which was really good and then walked across the street to the water fountain show at the Dubai Mall in the shadow of the Burj. This area all felt a little Vegas-y; huge restaurants, people everywhere, ridiculous buildings, fountain shows etc.  The malls in this part of the world are a major attraction though—everything from high end restaurants, to luxury shopping, to aquariums, to indoor ski slopes, etc can be found in there.  Think it’s mostly a result of the weather, but it is such a juxtaposition from the down-trending mall culture in the US.