Day 44: Bali, Indonesia

We were without internet last night due to the ship’s location (we had been warned that this would be the case), so I am posting this the next morning.  

If you, like me, are not very familiar with the Asian ports we’ll be visiting, I’m going to try to provide a little information about each port, mostly by (somewhat shamefully) plagiarizing from the Princess-published Port Guides. As you might know, I am not above stealing borrowing content from various sources, but I do always try to identify from which source I’ve stolen borrowed. If I get a nastygram from Princess Cruises, I’ll have to cease and desist, but between you and me, Princess Cruises has nothing to complain about (cough…eight years of free promotion…coughcough).  My additions will be in < >. 

The island of Bali is part of the Republic of Indonesia, the largest archipelago <there’s my favorite word again> in the world with over 18,000 islands. Bali is located on the southernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, lying between Java to the west and Lombok to the east <both are also part of Indonesia>. With a population of about 4.5 million people, Bali has a tropical climate year around, with a rainy season from December to March. 

It is generally believed that settlers from China arrived in Bali around 2500 BC. Over the centuries, immigrants from India and Java settled here and firmly planted their religious beliefs. While Islam spread throughout the archipelago during the 16th century, Bali remained dedicated to its own unique religion, Agama Hindu. Combining animism (ancestor worship) with Hindu and Buddhist beliefs, Bali remains steadfast in the middle of the world’s most populous Islamic country <and, past tensions have resulted in conflicts and deaths, as in the Kuta night club bombing in 2002, and again in 2005>. Bali is just 90 miles wide and 60 mile long, but is home to 20,000 temples of various sizes and religious meanings. Source:  Princess Cruises Port Guide for Bali

It’s midnight, the end of a wonderful day. We just took the one minute walk from watching “Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again” on MUTS (the big screen overlooking the Neptune Pool) to our cabin (we love this cabin location!). Considering we woke up at 5:30am, I guess it’s safe to say we are over our jet lag and caught up on our sleep. And, most fortunately, we will remain within one hour of this time zone until we fly to Hawaii in January. 

We made it to breakfast this morning for the first time this cruise (go us!), and were in the Horizon Court Buffet when it opened its full breakfast offerings at 6am. Since our arrival time in Bali was at 7am, and Princess excursion groups were meeting as early as 6:40am, the buffet was chaos. I found a table for two right in the traffic flow, and G found me, and we got our own coffees and juice because the wait staff was being run ragged. We returned to the cabin to pack up and were in the Savoy Dining Room shortly after 7am to pick up our Elite tender priority tickets. 

A Viking cruise ship had overnighted in Benoa, where the port is located, and had the berth, and the Sapphire Princess was so far from port that the tender ride was close to 40 minutes. That’s certainly not optimal, but there are other ports that are similar. However, Benoa is particularly tricky (as explained to us by Captain Ravera) because of the other boat traffic, especially freighters and fishing boats, and the currents and debris in the water. In fact, one of the Sapphire Princess tenders hit a submerged log today, damaging it and requiring the passengers to move from that tender to another one while afloat. 

Luckily, we faced none of those issues, and were on the second tender to shore. We joined up with a couple from the Viking ship and shared a taxi for the 25-minute ride to Kuta, a main tourist town due to its location next to a long, long stretch of wide beach. Our first impression of Bali?  Motorbikes and traffic. And crazy drivers who paid no heed to the rules of the road. 

We had decided not to get local currency from an ATM because this was our only visit to Indonesia and everyone accepted US$. 

Greeting by Balinese dancers

But Kuta Beach was spectacular, shallow, with bathwater-warm water and enough wave action to keep the many surfers happy. We quickly learned the ways of the beach (because, just like airport security practices, they’re different in every country). All along the beach were “beach bars” which were actually coolers filled with an assortment of drinks that were displayed on a table. For the price of a beverage (US $2 to $3 for sodas and beer), we had those stackable plastic chairs to sit on and shade provided by a fiberglass canopy stretched between the trees. 

Kuta Beach

This stretch of beach is miles long, with different names. 

Kuta Beach

We wasted no time getting into the water (one at a time, to keep an eye on our valuables). We have missed having a beach day so far this season!  We alternated between the water and the chairs in the shade, using cellular data to check on things at home, pay a couple of bills and upload photos to this blog. 

This is really good beer. Don’t ask me how I know. ;-)

Our hosts for the day, father and son, really nice guys. 

By noon I was getting hungry and there were plenty of mini restaurants, just ten feet wide or so, set in the sand all along the beach. But I knew G wouldn’t want to eat at them; he is a fussy, meat and potatoes-type eater, and if he can’t pronounce it, he isn’t going to eat it. Finally, at 2pm we left the beach and walked a block or so in from the beach to the Matahari Mall, a very small collection of a few stores, one of which was a pretty well stocked Food Mart.

Don’t ask me, I don’t know. 

We were at the beach so early that I observed several vendor placing plates of small arranged flowers on the sand. When I asked what these were, I learned they are daily offerings to the gods to bring blessings on their efforts. What a beautiful practice!

Daily offerings to the gods

Where there were rows and rows of cheap souvenir stands...

...there were many offerings outside on the sidewalk. 

No shortage of places to eat along the beach 

We took the opportunity of finding something resembling a grocery store at home to restock several items to carry us through to Shanghai (mouthwash, toothpaste, shampoos, face wash and makeup remover cloths and Mentos). We had a shopping bag heavy  with items and the total came to the equivalent of US $14.80. We couldn’t get over how inexpensive things were. Face wash for 50 cents. Mentos for 35 cents a roll. A large tube of toothpaste for 60 cents. It was tempting to buy more,  but we couldn’t. Very few toiletries will be able to fly to Hawaii with us. We’ll have to restock there…for ten times the cost. 

Of course, while we were in the store, we had to check out the fruits and veggies, too. This is always fun and there were several unidentifiable items (with tags in Balinese, so they weren’t much help). 

In the Kuta Foodmart, lots of fruits we didn’t recognize

We exited the store right into a taxi driver who offered to take us back to the port for US $20. This morning’s ride had cost US $25, but we had shared it with another couple. We probably could have found others going back to the ship to share a cab with if we had walked back to the beach, but we were heavily laden and it wasn’t worth the effort. Thirty minutes later we were standing in a long tender line. It was only 3:15pm and last tender wasn’t until 4pm, but I think everyone had the same idea, to avoid that last tender. 

It was hot and sunny (the forecasted heavy rains never materialized and we had a beautiful day) and the crew was passing out large Princess umbrellas to stand under (but we had our Tilley hats and full hands and didn’t take one) and water and cold washcloths that felt heavenly. We finally made it back to the ship about 4:30pm, showered and went to dinner in the Vivaldi Dining Room. 

I knew we’d be late leaving due to the tender situation, but, from the window next to our table, we continued to see tenders arriving packed with passengers. Each time we’d think it was the last one, but they continued to arrive until after 6pm. We later found out that the line at 4pm was exceptionally long, and excursions were still arriving back, delayed because they had gotten a late start due to the morning’s tendering issues. 

I guess I can see why we’re not returning to Bali on any of our other cruises this year. Still, we had a beautiful day and are happy to have gotten there one time, and to have spent the day on a Balinese Beach. The locals were so friendly and welcoming and many spoke excellent English. Due to its proximity, a lot of Australians vacation in Bali. In fact, the 2002 nightclub bombing killed over 200 people, many of them Australians. 

The show tonight in the Princess Theater was a female vocalist, Monique Lualhati from the Philippines, and she was really excellent. She was a finalist in The Voice and sang many of Celine Dion’s, Aretha Franklin’s, Tina Turner’s and Whitney Houston’s songs. Afterward, we still had energy (surprise!), and went to the movie on MUTS. 

The next two days are at sea, though we have evening commitments each night, so they’re not entirely free days. But we are firmly back in cruise mode, have restocked and are set to enjoy 34 more days on the Sapphire Princess. I can’t say the hardest part of our season is behind us, because many of these Asia ports are going to be challenging, but it’s nice to have the moving around complete and a few more beaches to look forward to. 

A sort of sunset from our table at dinner. 

Day 43: At Sea

This will be very quick tonight. It is 10pm and the alarm is set for 5:30am tomorrow, as we arrive in our first port of call, Benoa, in Bali, Indonesia. This is our only stop in Benoa, in fact, our only stop in Indonesia this season, it is a tender port, and we arrive at 7am. All good reasons to be up and out early. 

We sure weren’t up and out early today. I don’t know what it is: this cabin, which is quiet as a tomb; these beds, which are as comfortable as any we’ve ever slept on; the sea, which has been like bath water; and/or a combination of jet lag and exhaustion, but I had predicted we would crash on these first two days at sea, and that’s exactly what we’ve done. 

So, I have nothing particularly blog-worthy to report. We had lunch in the International Dining Room (calamari breaded without milk especially for me!), sat in padded loungers on the Promenade Deck most of the afternoon, had dinner in the Vivaldi Dining Room (cioppino!), chatted too long with fellow guests and didn’t get seats for tonight’s first Princess Theater show (acrobats, so that was fine by us), and instead listened to guitarist Danilo in Crooners and then the duo in the Wheelhouse. 

Not exactly riveting reading, but some days are like that. Sometimes, two days in a row are like that. The good news is that we finally feel caught up on rest (actually, G could have said that last night but I needed another day). And it isn’t like we have a grueling schedule ahead of us. After tomorrow in port we have two more sea days. I guess I’m not disappointed this run down to Bali will only happen once for us. Now that we’re no longer sleep deprived, that many sea days might start to feel confining. 

Oh, I can report on the weather before I close for the evening. We were 86F today with frequent fast moving rain showers. We passed the small islands of Indonesia all day long, and freighter traffic, though light, is fairly constant. Tomorrow’s forecast calls for heavy rain in the morning and late afternoon, with a more settled period in between. We knew this was the rainy season in Southeast Asia, and are not surprised. 

Day 42: At Sea

I slept 13 hours straight last night. 13 hours, and this after napping throughout the day. Yep, we were that tired, but we also felt so happy about all we’d done and seen since we left home six weeks ago. In fact, over dinner we agreed that our brief stay in Dubai, and the hotel we stayed at, was a perfect way to celebrate our 35th anniversary. It was as memorable as our honeymoon, a real stand out among all the places we’ve ever visited, and there’s admittedly been a fair bit of competition for that claim. 

For the first time ever, there was no need to spend time looking for things in the cabin this morning. It’s obvious to us that we know precisely how to unpack in a normal Princess Grand Class ship inside cabin. And that’s a good thing because I had just enough time to get showered before we went to breakfast/lunch in the International Dining Room at noon. 

It’s so interesting to see how this same ship that we were on just four weeks ago has an entirely different feel here in Southeast Asia. Part of it is the climate, of course (BTW, we passed over the equator just after 3am). Instead of that cold rain we had in Paris and Barcelona and Toulon, it is warm and sunny and the outside decks are full of passengers swimming and soaking up the rays. Our fellow guests (2800…this ship is full) are largely from the US and Canada, with a notable number from Australia and smaller number from the UK. As might be expected, I think there are large groups of Asian-Americans and Asian-Canadians on board, but far fewer numbers of people from these Southeast Asia countries. 

Our lunch companions were from New Zealand and Toronto, and the latter are staying on until Shanghai, as we are. The other couple was from Auckland and gave us several ideas for things to do in the ports, which we need. We’ll definitely be traveling by the seat of our pants for the next 38 days. 

We walked along the upper decks after lunch, including the area above the bridge which I’m quite happy is open on this ship. The Java Sea was just slightly dimpled today, and it’s hard to know we are even on a ship. We were sailing through an area of small islands, very green and somewhat hilly. It was beautiful. 

It was nearly 3pm when we returned to our cabin and we rested for another hour (we are so happy to be reunited with the Sapphire’s on demand TV system. What a difference from both the Norwegian Spirit and Pacific Princess!). We watched the port lecture that had been given this morning on our first port of Benoa, Bali, Indonesia. This entire area is new to us; these lectures will hopefully be very helpful (hopefully!). 

We worked together to cut our hair before our first formal night of the cruise. I am a mess, travel weary, full of bruises on my arms and legs from hanging on to bars on buses and subways and having train and elevator doors close on me and hauling luggage. Being two weeks behind on my hair cut made me feel particularly shabby. But you haven’t heard me mention hair color…and you won’t, either. I took the plunge last spring and let my grey hair grow out. I had tried this when I turned 50, but it was too soon and I looked too unkempt.  But now, after a summer of looking like a calico cat, I no longer have to worry about searching high and low to find Dark Blonde (Golden) hair color in a Southeast Asia port. 

We needed to do the personal clean up; we had to pose for formal portraits again tonight (and I bet you know why ;-)). We went wild, and had them taken with three different back drops. Then we went to a new table for dinner in the Vivaldi Dining Room. That was a surprise; we had received a table re-assignment card in our mailbox this morning, and weren’t sure what to expect, but we discovered that we are now next to a window in a quiet corner of the dining room.

It’s good to be home!

Tonight was the Captain’s Welcome Aboard Party and Champagne Waterfall, but we just walked through, stopping only to give/get hugs from a few crew members and officers who welcomed us back. We went to the Princess Theater early enough to score two of those extra legroom seats. I napped again tonight…but only during the 45 minute wait for production show Born to be Wild to begin. Once it did, I was all eyes and ears. I love that pink Cadillac on stage!

G is out listening to…something, either Big Band or Disco. The Asian couples onboard offer some of the best entertainment around; their dance skills are always fun to watch. I am tucked into bed blogging and watching TV. And, speaking of beds, I don’t know what mattresses we have, but they are fantastic!  This is not the same as every other Princess Luxury Bed I’ve slept on over the years. These are like those on the Norwegian Spirit; firm enough for me, cushion-y enough for G, and my back is already happy with the change. 

G claims he’s going to wake me up tomorrow to watch the sunrise. I’m rather dubious. But I know the man…once he sets his mind on something, he usually makes it happen. And if we pull that off, I think I’ll be able to say we’re over the jet lag and the busy days of sightseeing, followed by more jet lag, and are ready to start exploring the ports. They will be so different from anything we’ve ever seen. In the words of McGee, I just don’t know what to expect. 

But I know I can’t wait. :-)

Day 41: Embarkation on the Sapphire Princess

We are safely here, we are on the Sapphire Princess, we are well settled into our cabin for the next 38 nights...and we are seriously wiped out. We both just slept through the hyper-energetic production show Let Us Entertain You. Slept through it. Thankfully, we were wise enough to sit in those ‘lots of legroom’ seats in the middle of the Princess Theater, and not in the front row.  And, even worse, I had napped this afternoon while G unpacked, and again in a lounger on the Promenade Deck waiting for the elevators to free up after muster drill. I, who never nap, am now doing it in public. 

We thought we had slept fairly well on our overnight Singapore Air flight from Dubai to Singapore.  We had actually sprung for Economy Plus seats (only because, due to some internet pricing snafu, they were priced lower than Economy seats the day we made our reservation). On Singapore Air, this meant a more deeply reclining seat in a 2-3-2 configuration, extra room on the arm rests, and, best of all, leg rests. I know I was asleep just as soon as I finished my dinner, and I slept until things started to stir on the plane about 90 minutes prior to landing, when a light breakfast was served, but 5 hours of sleeping on a plane, even in an Economy Plus seat, is not equivalent to sleeping in bed. 

We went through Singapore immigration, I’m sure we did, and the stamps in my passport serve as proof, but, I’ll be darned if I remember it. I also don’t recall claiming our luggage. I know that, because we arrived so early (8am), we waited about an hour for the first Princess shuttle to the ship at the Marina Bay Cruise Port. Seeing the dramatic architecture of the Marina Bay Hotel perked me up a bit, and got me through the wait to board the ship. We were putting our carry on bags in our cabin and our valuables in our safe by noon, even though our cabin wasn’t yet ready.  We immediately went down to the International Dining Room for that wonderful Princess embarkation day lunch, then returned to our room to unpack our carry ons. 

We are in an inside cabin on Lido Deck for the next three (or is it four?  I honestly don’t know) cruises, and it is so nice to once again have the unbeatable storage these cabins provide. With the three drawers in the vanity, the two drawers in each nightstand, the three shelves on the end of the vanity and all the cubbies, we’re only about 50% full. We’ve left the cold weather clothing in the suitcases (I’d love to wash it one of these sea days), brought out the tropical wear in its place and the closet looks downright empty. 

Our big suitcases were delivered soon after, and G unpacked his while I took my first nap of the day. I slept through the noise he was making and his shower, until I was awakened by the muster drill announcements. Afterward, as I said, I slept on the Promenade Deck until some work out there woke me up. I returned to the cabin to unpack my suitcase, shower and then met G in the Vivaldi Dining Room for dinner. Our table for two is just that...barely. The next table for two is about five inches away, and we are not near a window.  Granted, we’ve been rather spoiled by our Maitre d’s lately, and it’s been a long time since we’ve been seated in the dark corners of a dining room, but we will survive and, hopefully, improve our assigned seating a bit next cruise. 

Our servers, Jeff and Jovvel from the Philippines, are great, very smiley and polite. Our headwaiter Nazzario from Italy has been filled in on my dining requirements by one of our headwaters from last year on the Golden Princess, Felix, who just boarded today, so I am being well looked after. Still, it was all we could do to stay awake through dinner, and if either one of us had declined to attend the show tonight, I’m certain neither of us would have gone. But it was a production show, and we don’t often miss those.  Unless we sleep through them, that is. 

We moved clocks forward three hours from Venice to Dubai, and four hours from Dubai to Singapore. We are now 13 hours ahead of EST, a difference that makes it harder and harder to communicate in real time with folks at home. (And we will forever be begging forgiveness from friends we woke up in the middle of the night with texts from Dubai). Ah well, there’s always old-fashioned email, I guess. 

First up in this cruise are two sea days, and we are thrilled about that. We need to spend at least one of them recovering from the pace of the past 40 days.   We have loved them, every one of them, and wouldn’t change a single plan we made, but a restful sea day comprised of reading and eating and naps sounds pretty good right now. 

And so begins the second segment of our ninth season of travel.

Life is good. :-)

Cruise #4: Malaysian Peninsula and Indonesia

We finally catch up to the Sapphire Princess!

Totally new territory and a double crossing of the equator...we’re excited about this one. (Frankly, the two days at sea at the beginning sound pretty good to me right now, too.)

Day 40: Dubai to Singapore

It was wonderful to turn the alarm off last night and allow ourselves to sleep until we woke up naturally. For me, that was around 7am, and I took advantage of my quiet time to write blog posts. By 9am or so we were at our final breakfast at The Palace Downtown, and that was truly a sad realization. Our breakfasts have been our biggest meals of the day, and kept us going right until dinner. 

Today, our three waiters surprised us with a slice of cake, big smiles and hugs to say goodbye. The service level at this property was the best we’ve ever experienced. We are so completely happy with how we spent our time in Dubai and also with where we stayed. If we ever go again, we’d stay at the same place, but since that was a once in a lifetime experience…well, I’m not holding my breath. 

One final Burj Khalifa view breakfast

Breakfast, round 1

Our wonderfully fantastic, attentive and very, very sweet team of waiters surprised us with a farewell cake. We’re totally spoiled, but it’s their fault! :-) 

Breakfast, round 2

Those weird fruits are passion fruit

We sat out by the pool until noon, then headed inside to pack. We had gotten late check out since our flight to Singapore wasn’t until 8pm. We also wanted to update apps and download videos before we lost our super high speed WiFi. So one of us at a time sat on the bed and did that, and the other packed, and then we switched.  

Surprise of surprises, there were fountain shows at 1pm and 2 pm. We didn’t expect that, and had never before been in our room at that time of day. It was a very nice last memory to have of the hotel and our Dubai adventure.

A fountain show in the afternoon. Who knew?

Packing up with a view. Life is good. :-)

At 2pm we stored our luggage at the bell desk and walked over to the Dubai Mall to use one last benefit of our HOHO bus experience: free admission to the Dubai Aquarium and Underwater Zoo, both located at the mall. Since this was free with a 3-day City Sightseeing HOHO pass, I wasn’t expecting much, but it was quite good. The lighting was all wrong for photos (too many reflections on the glass), but aquarium tunnels are always cool and we saw several divers in the tanks, too. 

Aquarium tunnel

Spotted ray

Michigan colored coral. Some slight consolation after Saturday’s game. :-(

Whatever this is, it’s a big one!

Still, seeing the Aquarium was not without its challenges. We had walked by it at least once a day every day since we arrived in Dubai, and kept saying, “We’ll leave that for the last day after we check out of our room”. Do you think we could find it today?  It took us wandering at least 20 minutes and asking 3 people for assistance to finally reach it. Then, walking back to The Palace Downtown, we took a wrong turn in the Souk Al Bahar and ended up in an area we’d never before seen. Honestly, we asked security guards for directions to the hotel so many times over the days we were there that they would recognize us and simply point. “That way”. 

Lost again, we saw a part of the Souk Al Bahar we’d never before wandered through. 

It took awhile but we made it back to our hotel, reclaimed our luggage and were preparing to order an Uber when a waiting Lexus offered to take us to the airport for even less than Uber had cost us. We were in it and on our way in no time, and arrived at the airport with time to spare, which we filled with people watching. People watching in the International Terminal at Dubai’s airport is nothing short of fascinating. 

Finally we were through security, and I spent our last dirhams for mints for Singapore (no gum there) and snacks. The guys in the store were great, asking me how much I had to spend (45 dirhams, about $12) and then showing me different things to maximize their value. Finally, they threw in a candy bar that G ate on the plane, and the dirhams were gone. 

I took an Ambien before I got on the plane, took my contacts out, and I barely remember my meal. We had sprung for Economy Plus seats, because on Singapore Air, that gave us a special menu, a leg rest and a seat that reclines more. That, plus the Ambien did what I hoped, and I slept about 5 hours (the flight was about 7 hours long), giving me hope that I’d make it through the day without a nap. (Edited later: haha, I napped all day.)

Next stop:  Singapore!

Day 39: Dubai

G did get up with the alarm at 5am, but he didn’t wake me until closer to 6. Still, we were at breakfast well before 6:30am, sitting inside today because it was still pouring outside. Pouring!  Everyone we talked with said Dubai gets rain just three times a year, but that they hadn’t seen one like this in years. Lovely! Checking the weather on our iPhones, the forecast called for a rainy morning but a sunny afternoon. We could work with that. 

The reason we had set an alarm is that we had firm plans for the morning. The El Jumeirah Mosque, through its Sheikh Mohammed Center for Cultural Understanding’s ‘Open Doors, Open Minds’ program allows non-Muslims to enter the mosque for a 75 minute presentation and Q and A on the tenets of the Muslim religion and Emirati culture. This turned out to be, without a doubt, the highlight of our Dubai visit. We learned so much about things I had been very curious about, including the calls to prayer that we had heard twice yesterday while at the Dubai Mail (where there are five prayer rooms). 

The most photographed mosque in Dubai

We started with an Arabic continental breakfast 

We learned about the five pillars of Muslim, including Ramadan and the Hajj, the trip to Kabba (House of God) in the sacred city of Mecca, that they must do at least once in their lives.  We learned how they perform wudu, the symbolic cleansing before prayers, and then we actually got to watch our guide go through the prayer process and that was fascinating. They pray five times each day, for about 3 minutes each time, facing Mecca. 

Where the preparing ablutions, called wudu, are performed. 

There was proper attire available for men and women. 

I had worn slacks and a long sleeved T-shirt, and covered my head and shoulders with my hijab. G wore one of these robes. 

Every mosque has a dome...

...a Mihrab, which is a niche that designates the Qiblah, which faces the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca...

...and at least one minaret, from which the calls to prayer are sounded.   

We had removed our shoes before entering the mosque, but everything was covered with thick carpet, so “that foot” was quite happy. 

Showing us the Kaaba in Mecca 

The sacred city of Mecca

Muslim Prayers

I asked a lot of questions (because of course I did), and afterward, one on one, I asked one more, about the different types of clothing we had seen since we arrived in Dubai. I wasn’t certain if it was religious or cultural. For the men, it is definitely cultural, and he explained that what he was wearing was the equivalent of a Western suit, but pointed out someone else who was wearing more casual Arab dress. For women it is different, and the degree to which they cover up is a personal choice. We have seen everything from a simple hijab like I wore for our tour to full burkas covering everything but the eyes. 

Afterward, we reboarded our HOHO bus and went out to Palm Island for an included cruise. Luckily, the sun was out by then but it wasn’t as hot as yesterday, and we had a most pleasant hour-long cruise around Palm Island, which is the man-made island in the shape of a palm tree. I got better photos of the Burj Al Arab today because the sun was out, with the Jumeirah Wave hotel behind it and Downtown Dubai with the Burj Khalifa in the photo too. And, on the other side of Palm Island, we saw the Dubai Marina area, which is largely made up of high rise residential properties. 

The Burj Al Arab with the Jumeirah Wave Hotel on it’s right and Downtown Dubai, with the Burj Khalifa on its left.

The Dubai Marina area, largely residential high rises 

The Atlantis Resort on Palm Island

Everything on Palm Island and in the Dubai Marina was so different than what I had imagined it would be. Bigger, much bigger, with huge traffic and construction and, really, one afternoon was enough for me.  I’m very, very happy with where we stayed, in the Downtown Dubai area. The traffic is crazy there, too, but we could walk everywhere, and there were things right in that area to see and do all day and night. 

We were starting to fade, but took the HOHO bus to the Mall of the Emirates to see Ski Dubai. We had thought that at least G would ski, but the prices were crazy (nearly $50 for two very short runs), so instead we had lunch at a TGIFridays overlooking the top of the ski hill, and the chair lift and tow rope. We could tell how short the run was by how often the same skiers came up the tow rope and waved at us. 

These are in dirhams...and it’s still crazy expensive

A snow slide


The downhill run and chair lift




The tow rope


The tobaggon run

After we finished eating, we went down to a lower viewing area and saw the toboggan run.  G pointed out that, for many people, Ski Dubai was the first time they had ever seen snow. Lucky, lucky them!  I noticed they didn’t include the snow shoveling experience, nor the winter driving or slipping on ice experiences either. ;-) Hey, let them see what it’s really like!

We took a HOHO bus back to the Dubai Mall, arrived there just before 6pm when the City Lights tours begin on the HOHO bus. and hopped on that bus to see the city at night (which we had already done on our way from the airport, but we were half asleep then). I decided that by City Lights, they mean tail lights. I have never, ever seen such traffic. But it was highly entertaining, from our seats on the upper deck at the very front, watching our driver navigate through that mess. 

Dubai traffic is crazy

I loved this. Ace’s name is always slanted; Arabic reads from right to left. So the Arabic word for Ace is slanted, too...in the opposite direction. 

And that is how we came to arrive back at our room at 9pm, 13 hours after we had left it. We had just enough energy to watch a couple of light and fountain shows (the last ones from bed) before we hit the wall. G is asleep, and once I finish this post, I will be, too. 

We will miss this view!

One more partial day in Dubai, and an overnight flight to Singapore. In the words of Dora the Explorer, “Can we do it?  Yes we can!”

And then, once on the Sapphire, we will collapse.