December 2nd is the UAE's National Day (ie USA's Independence Day). Last year we had quite the experience as we went down to the Abu Dhabi corniche for the festivities. After vowing to never do that again, we decided to try out Dubai this year.
On Thursday, we met up with one of my coworkers P and his wife A and we drove out to the Rugby 7s. None of us are really all that into rugby, but we enjoyed being outside in the nice weather and had fun watching the social games that were on that day.
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| you know us... the crazy party animals |
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| Rugby 7s |
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| A & I "pushed" a Range Rover over a "hill" to win the boys a ruby ball |
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| Beautiful sunset (Paul, Joscly, A, & P) |
On Friday, we slept in and then walked over to the Jumeirah Beach. The sun was shining and the temperature was about 80°F—perfect! Paul and I relaxed on the beach and threw the Frisbee. The Jumeirah beach is much nicer than the Abu Dhabi Corniche beach—the sand is finer, there are lumps of concrete in the water, there is a different crowd, and it’s much easier to get to as you can just walk there from where we were staying.
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View of the Jumeirah Beach from the apartment we were house sitting
(that's the Palm Jumeirah Island on the right...Atlantis is the building with the hole in it) |
Friday afternoon the festivities for the national day kicked off. My favorite part was a couple of “trick” planes that flew by. They started off by making a “40” with their contrails and then they continued to do tricks, etc. for about 15 minutes. Cars started crowding the JBR walk with all of their UAE pride and loud honking.
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| the "40" contrail |
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| a fake "crash" |
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| They were flying one upside down on top of the other -- Top Gun style |
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| The Jumeirah Beach Walk is ALWAYS packed with cars...I really don't understand why people continue to drive down it |
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| One of the classier car decorations |
We headed out of the marina area for a while to hang out at one of Paul’s friends’ place for a party. On our way back, we dropped by F & C’s place for a couple of hours. We got to meet C’s parents who were in town from France for some wedding planning :)
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| The Atlantis Hotel on Palm Jumeirah (can you see the 40s on both sides? I didn't notice until someone pointed it out) |
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| Jumairah Beach Walk was still hopping late into the night |
The next morning we grabbed a few shwarmas and headed back down to the beach. This time we ventured a bit further out into the water and did some body surfing which was surprisingly good. We walked up to the Hilton and met back up with P & A for a little bit before heading back to Abu Dhabi. It was a nice, unexpected, long weekend.
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4 comments:
Nice get away weekend. Apartment sitting seems fun. Was the crazy traffic near the Ritz Carlton and the "mexican" restaurant we ate at?
Apartment sitting is fun when we're in Dubai :)
That is exactly the place. That roundabout leads you to the Ritz and on the other side is On the Border where we ate and Scoozi.
Looks like a fun time in Dubai. Did you photoshop in your photos on the newspaper or was that an actual front page? Did you guys really push a Range Rover or was it some sort of simulation game? Lastly, are the small chunks of concrete in the water in Abu Dhabi Corniche beach or at Jumeirah Beach? If the latter, I dont understand why that would be a good thing.
The "newspaper" was actually one of those photo booth things where you stand behind it and take a photo, except instead of just a cut-out for your head, it was a whole square with a "crowd background." I did photoshop it a little bit to square it up and get rid of the surroundings.
Some people really pushed the Land Rover over this incline, but for us (and the kids) the guy sitting in the car helped us out by stepping on the gas :)
The concrete chunks are in the water of the Abu Dhabi corniche. They're all over the "wading" depth area...right where you want to stand.
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