I feel like I always start these posts by saying how long it’s been since I last wrote something, but then the last blog post was for Croatia, which I traveled to in August 2020, so this time it REALLY has been a while. However, I now managed to get to this mere days after coming back from Dubai, so at least the memory is still fresh in my mind.

I posted a lot of pictures of this trip on my Instagram account (sorry for that by the way. I got excited). But then Instagram is a medium where people tend to show all that is nice and good, whereas this blog is more like a reflection on what I did, highlighting both the good and the bad. Dubai is not a perfect place, even though it mostly looks like it when you see all these influencers (and me) posting about it online.

This blog has always not only been for other people to read, but also a sort of personal diary I can look back on years from now and reminisce on things I have experienced throughout my youth (although some might question how youthful I really am).

So I hope you enjoy this insight into my reflection on these ten days in a country far away…ish.

Day 1: Arrival in Dubai, Gold Souk and Dubai Frame

I got to Dubai in the early morning of February 11th and went straight to the hotel, where Philip had already checked in the night before. Not wanting to waste any time, we had breakfast and left the hotel pretty soon after to explore the city.

Now this is the first suboptimal (and this is me being generous with my wording) part of our Dubai experience. The hotel was located in Deira, which is in the northern part of town and close to a) the airport and b) the old town. However, it is not AT ALL close to c) everything else in Dubai.

Somehow we completely misjudged how close we were to most of the tourist attractions and Downtown Dubai, which meant we were an hour away from most of what Dubai is known for (the Dubai Marina, Palm Jumeirah, JBR Beach, etc.) when taking the Metro. The Dubai Metro has a lot of room for improvement. There’s two Metro lines in all of Dubai and they are, no matter what day or time it is, always completely packed with people. So whenever we would take the Metro, it meant we’d be standing for the entirety of our ride.

Nevertheless, taking the Metro, especially if you have a Nol card (which is essentially an Oyster card) is so much cheaper than taking an Uber or a Careem.

So once we found out that our choice of hotel had been extremely unfortunate, we decided to spend our first day exploring the surrounding Souks, or markets, and go to the Dubai Frame, which was the only tourist attraction nearby.

The Gold Souk and Grand Souk Deira were both interesting, but in all honesty, the souks I had previously seen in Morocco were much better and more colourful. What was, however, extremely interesting was us witnessing the Friday noon prayer, the Jum’ah, the most important prayer in Islam, as we were told.

Whoever didn’t make it to the nearby Mosque in time, rolled out their prayer mat in the middle of the street and prayed right there and then, which was truly fascinating to see. While some tourists found it appropriate to film this, I obviously won’t have any pictures or videos of what was a sacred moment for so many people.

What I do have pictures of is the Dubai Frame, which in my humble opinion is cooler than the Burj Khalifa. Whereas from the Frame you can see the Burj in the far distance (you can see it from anywhere in Dubai), once you are in the Burj Khalifa, there’s nothing cool to see outside, as even the tallest skyscrapers don’t seem that tall anymore.

Day 2: Dubai Mall and Burj Khalifa

On our second day in Dubai, we decided to explore the Dubai Mall, as we had booked tickets to Burj Khalifa, which is right next to it, in the afternoon.

Dubai Mall is sure as hell the absolute biggest shopping mall I have ever seen. Apart from stores and restaurants, the mall houses a waterfall, an aquarium and a mini-souk with a dinosaur skeleton (yeah you read that right). We probably spent 3 hours just walking around the place, and still didn’t see all of it.

For our Burj Khalifa visit we needed to make a decision: either buy the slightly more expensive ticket with entry closer to sunset time OR buy a cheaper ticket and wait in the Burj Khalifa for 2.5 hours until the sun sets, even though there’s no seating in there (at least not in the 124th floor).

Well if you know me or Philip, you will know we got the cheaper ticket and sat on the bloody floor until the sun finally set. It was beautiful to see the sun set from this high up, but in hindsight we probably should have stayed in the Burj a little longer to see the city light up once it get’s dark.

Once the sun did set, we went down again and watched the Fountain show next to Dubai Mall, which was actually much cooler than we had expected. It’s a water show that happens every half hour from 6pm and each show is different (different music, different water effects, etc.). The show itself is only 5 minutes long, so nothing you need to plan into your schedule.

Day 3: EXPO 2020

On Sunday we went to EXPO 2020 and let me tell you: I absolutely loved it!

The entire exhibition is ginormous and it is quite simply impossible to see everything in one day. But to make the most of your visit there, EXPO offers Smart Queues, which is a service on their website, in which you can book 10 pavilions for specific time slots and don’t have to stand in their queues. Unprepared as we were, we obviously only learned about this at 5pm on the day we were there and made minimal use of it. This meant we ended up not being able to get into the German Pavilion, but did manage to see others like the UK, Austria, Switzerland, Brazil, Italy, Singapore, etc.

What I also loved about the EXPO, is that you can buy an Expo Passport for 5 Euros and get stamps from every pavilion you visit. Being a self-proclaimed travelholic, I tried to get as many stamps as possible. At some point I just left Philip to sit and rest and tried to get as many stamps as possible by myself. It was every man (or woman) for himself.

Now what I didn’t love all that much was how insanely expensive the food was. I have to admit this is partially our fault, as there were cheaper options (the street food stands, for example), but we wanted to go to a proper restaurant, so decided to go to a Vietnamese one (for reference: in Europe, Vietnamese restaurants tend to be the cheaper ones). After paying 20 Euros for a Pho soup we were not as happy with our decision anymore.

Following a long day of walking around at EXPO, we headed home…one the Metro…for 1.5 hours…standing.

Day 4: Desert Sleepover

On Monday we were picked up from our hotel and driven to the desert. We booked our tour via Get Your Guide, as I always do. The tour included dune bashing, sand boarding, two camel rides and an overnight stay at a desert camp with shisha, henna tattoos and dinner and breakfast. The tour itself was extremely cool, the guide was very sweet and the food was great! My highlight was discovering Laquaimat, a local dessert. It is basically a dough ball covered in honey and sesame seeds and tastes amazing.

As this was the second time in my life I slept in a desert, I couldn’t help but compare this to the time I slept in the Sahara desert and I have to say, the Sahara desert was better. The desert in Dubai is very close to the actual city, meaning that light pollution disturbs what is supposed to be a clear sky at night and airplanes were constantly flying over the camp. Also – and I am not completely sure if I remember this correctly – I think the Saharan desert was much warmer at night. The Dubai desert was freezing cold at night (and yes, I know it gets cold at night in the desert), so me and my unprepared self spent most of the night just shivering in bed (thanks to a certain someone, who is known for being a blanket thief).

Day 5: Back to the city

On day 5 we had breakfast in the desert, followed by a camel ride as the sun was rising behind the dunes and then drove back to Dubai.

Philip had been wanting to spent a day at the beach, so we decided to explore JBR Beach, which is next to Palm Jumeirah. This corner of Dubai felt so much more westernised than the part in which our hotel was. Most women were wearing dresses, shorts and skirts and the restaurants nearby had nothing of the Middle Eastern flair we had seen near our hotel.

The promenade along JBR made me feel a little bit like I was back in Barcelona. We ended our day by going to the Cheesecake Factory and having what was probably a genetically modified cheesecake, which took me three days to finish. When I asked, I was told that unfortunately, Penny didn’t work there anymore…

Day 6: Beach day (number 2)

We had both decided that given the local temperature (23-28 degrees) one beach day was definitely not enough. So on this sunny Wednesday we decided to go to the beach again and see the Palm Jumeirah while we’re at it. Luckily enough, we had a very smart and somewhat cheeky Careem driver, who took us all the way to the Atlantis Palm Jumeirah hotel, a very expensive all inclusive hotel right next to a waterpark. Our driver told the security guard we were heading to check in and just like that we had “infiltrated” the gates to this gigantic hotel with a pool AND a private beach (because having just one isn’t gonna cut it). Considering I am a failed actress, I have to say it was an Oscar-worthy performance as I walked through that lobby and tanned on their sun-beds, ate the ice popsicles they offered us and pretended I was, without a doubt, a guest at their hotel.

Day 7: Abu Dhabi

On our 7th day in the UAE, we decided to explore another one of the seven emirates. We booked a tour to Abu Dhabi, exploring the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, the Etihad Towers and Qasr al Watan, the Presidential Palace.

Now Abu Dhabi was completely different than we had imagined it to be. We had expected it to be much more traditional, both in terms of the mentality, as well as the architecture. However, it was quite modern in both ways. Although it had much less skyscrapers than Dubai, there are a fair few scattered around the city. And while I was worried as to what I could wear in the capital of the UAE, I only had to put on the traditional Abaya (the black dress) and head scarf in the mosque. As soon as we got out I was able to wear trousers and a sleeveless top and show my hair.

While the mosque was extremely beautiful and the Etihad towers impressive and offered a great view of the city, the highlight for both of us was the Presidential Palace, simply because of how over the top it was.

There was, unfortunately no time to go into the Louvre Museum or Ferrari World, two attractions Abu Dhabi is also well known for. However, we did get to see the beautiful Louvre museum from outside and marvel at its interesting shape, which doesn’t resemble the Parisian one at all. We stayed there long enough to take some pictures and headed back to Dubai.

Day 8: Heritage Village and Global Village

This was the last day we actively wanted to explore the city. We had realised that on our first day at the souks, we hadn’t actually seen much of the old town in Deira, so decided to go back there again. We took the Metro to Ghubaiba Metro Station and walked around Heritage Village and the nearby old town. The souks in this part of the old town were much prettier than the ones we had previously seen. What I found quite amusing as well, was the Starbucks in the middle of the historical part of Dubai.

We had planned to take a water taxi back (which you can also pay for with your Nol card), but silly us didn’t realise it was once again Friday at 1pm and everyone was praying. We were told there wasn’t going to be another taxi for an hour at least, so we made our way back to the hotel taking the Metro.

In the evening we decided to head to Global Village, which is essentially an amusement park, consisting of several pavilions that represent countries. Inside the pavilion you can buy things that originally come from that country. The Iranian pavilion, for example, offers Iranian rugs for those that wish to buy some but don’t want to or can’t fly to the country.

Most pavilions were countries nearby the UAE (Iran, Iraq, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, etc.). Then there was good ol’ “Africa” as one single pavilion, which was only acceptable because “Europe” and “The Americas” also got one pavilion for an entire continent.

What we didn’t get to do, but might also have been nice, was Miracle Garden, which is a beautiful flower garden not far from Global Village. We decided not to go there because you have to take a taxi to Miracle Garden and then another one from there to Global Village as no form of public transportation connects both of them (and walking is simply not an option in Dubai). Who knows, there might be a next time for us and if there is, I will make sure to stop by.

Day 9: Yes, another beach day

On our final day in Dubai we had realised that we had seen everything we wanted to and were ready to just spent one entire day at the beach. Since we didn’t want to take the Metro for an hour, nor take a Careem (the UAE version of an Uber, although they also have Uber there), we found another beach that we could reach by bus: La Mer Beach.

This beach honestly exceeded our expectations. There were so many restaurants nearby, the water was absolutely clear, albeit freezing cold, and the beach was very clean.

We spent our last day there, burning in the sun (according to a Careem driver, it was apparently obvious we were both Germans, because of how red we looked – as a half Brazilian I was truly offended).

Day 10: Time to go back home

We had to leave early in the morning on day 10 and almost missed our flights because of the huge queue at baggage drop (even though we got to the airport 2 hours before our flights).

But all was good in the end and I managed to get my flight back to Vienna, watching the Friends Reunion and singing along to Phoebe’s “Smelly Cat”.

All in all, Dubai was a very exciting and unique experience. It had it’s upsides and downsides, but we did enjoy our vacation very much. At the end of the day, we just should have chosen a different hotel and most of what bothered us, would have been resolved.

I do have to say though that 80% of the people that live in Dubai are not locals, but so-called Expats, foreigners that moved to Dubai. I assume they are called Expats, because no matter how long you live there, you never get UAE citizenship. The reason I say this, is because for anyone looking for an authentic experience in the Middle East, Dubai is not it. It is not an authentic place, but instead very commercial and over the top (which I like, hence why I went). Just wanted to leave this as a disclaimer here, for anyone hoping to meet local people. We only met one local guy. For a more authentic (and budget friendlier) experience I would suggest Morocco instead.

But if Dubai is exactly what you want, then I could absolutely recommend it and hope to see it again some day.