When possible we schedule a trip to Dubai. We stay and few nights in the city and then head to the Al Maha Resort for a few nights.
Dubai - J W Marriott & Le Meridien
We like spending a couple of days in Dubai and visiting the Dubai Mall for treats to take home. Our two favourite hotels are the J W Marriott hotel downtown and the Le Meridien hotel by the airport. At the executive level, both offer food during the day which is relaxing without having to go to a restaurant. The J W Marriott have a bar called the ‘Vault’ with stunning views of the city and the Burj Khalifa.
The Le Meridien has a dedicated entrance for the executive club with a restaurant on the ground floor that serves complimentary breakfast, afternoon tea and happy hour. There is so much food you don’t need to go to any of the 13 retaurants. We asked to see the menus once and they brought us leather bound copies of them in a pile! We stopped looking as soon as we saw the Chinese restaurant has Crispy Aromatic Duck, similar to Peking Duck but no BBQ sauce, which we miss from living in the UK. We’ve also been for drinks at other restaurants and listened to artists like a saxophone player. There is a dedicated pool with views of the city and it is very relaxing to stay here.
Al Maha Resort
The Al Maha Resort is stunning. It is so peaceful and serene. You can sit outside and listen to the pigeons and other birds. There are small gazelles roaming the property and occasionally a large Oryx. The resort is about an hour outside of Dubai. It is set in the Dubai Desert Conservation Reserve that the Sheikh has given to the people for the preservation and restoration of Flora and wildlife. There are large reservoirs of water and they are planting trees and grasses to eventually have roots long enough to reach the water table.
The resort is all-inclusive for breakfast, lunch and dinner with an indoor dining room and tables outside to view the desert and roaming gazelles. Alcohol is additional and very expensive, but they have a good range of choices. The food is amazing, with so many flavours. The resort is based on the idea of giving an experience of how the nomadic Bedouins used to live. There are items on the menu to reflect this. The room has ceilings made to reproduce a tent with a private infinity pool that you can have set to the temperature that you want. Each day you can experience 2 activities to give an idea of the Bedouin lifestyle.
A good introduction to the resort and the area is to get up early the next day for the hour-long Nature walk with the ranger. This shows you the different trees in the area and what uses the Bedouins had, such as for cleaning their teeth. We saw animal trails in the sand for snakes, foxes and antelope. The sand has some iron in it and this gives it it’s reddish tint. Sometimes this tour is done around the resort and it’s good to see all the watering holes to maybe go back later to catch some wildlife drinking.
Another experience is the camel trek to see the sunset. You can see the camels being led to the mounting area about 4:00pm. We were near the front of the line of camels and there are two people to a camel. There is a demonstration for how to sit on the camel when they get up and down – just hold on and lean back! It is an awkward gait but an awesome experience to slowly walk through the dessert as the sun is setting. You end up at the same place to watch the sunset as those that go by the 4-wheel drive. The Bedouins would travel about 30K a day. There is a lovely glow to the dunes after sunset so the 25 minute ride back is a contemplative time.
There is an hour wild life drive around the conservation area to see different animals, the fish and birds in the lake and the date palms. The dunes are like waves on the ocean, continuously moving so there are different routes each day. The Arabian Oryx (Al Maha) has been brought back from extinction in this area. We have seen males fighting but mainly grazing. The antelopes can pull the branches of the trees down so they can eat the leaves. There are solar panels throughout the area to pump water up for the trees.
Another early start is to see the falconry display. Here you can also see the balloon flight and hear the burners going for them to get more height. Each bird of prey has their own personality and the rangers work with a bird to get a bond. They still misbehave and fly off and the ranger has to go into the dessert to retrieve them. The display is about an hour of the rangers flying the hawks and owls to show how they were used to hunt animals for the Bedouins. At the end of the display the birds are brought around and you can hold them. They are so majestic close up. They all have hoods on so they are kept calm.
The Bedouins used the falcons to hunt for prey and also used their own bow and arrows. It’s fun to try out the archery and there is a competition to see how many arrows you can shoot on target in a certain time.
