The plan this morning was to go to the Jumeirah Mosque but at the last minute, we discovered that the tours were not available on Wednesdays. At least that's what we think we worked out.
Instead, it was off to Deira City after breakfast. for a coffee and then we caught the train to Dubai Mall (apparently the largest in the world - the mall not the train!). No doubt the Emirates are giving the Americans a run for their money when it comes to 'big' things.
The train system is pretty impressive. All fairly new and everything is air conditioned - station and train. The train is also driverless. On arriving at the Mall station we had about a kilometre (at least it felt that long) to walk along elevated walkways. It's just amazing how much construction is going on here. It's interesting that it seems OK in Dubai but if someone wanted to do something similar at home everyone would be up in arms about it.
Our first stop at the mall was the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world (there we go - biggest again). We took a lift to the 148th floor 555 metres above the ground. It was pretty amazing to look down on many of the other skyscrapers - Dubai presently has 246. The only unfortunate thing was that it was very hazy (something to do with the change of season we are told - guess it's sand in the air) and you can't see very far into the distance. We couldn't see the Burj Al Arab or Palm Jureirah for instance. Jill chickened out on going to the top and had a lovely peaceful time at the bottom.
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| The Burj Khalifa |
We grabbed some lunch and had a look around the Mall. Another huge aquarium tank - very impressive (51mx20mx11m), also an ice rink. Apparently, they also have a very impressive fountain display outside but it was not operating today.
Night cruises are a popular pastime along Dubai Creek as there are all sorts of craft out on the water - all colourfully lit. It's all pretty impressive as was our meal. After dinner, we were treated to some Arabic entertainment. Sword dances and the Tanoura dance (an Egyptian folk dance) where men wear long colourful skirts and create some pretty amazing images by twirling around at high speed. Not sure how it is managed without getting dizzy. This was in addition to a singer who had been entertaining us all night.
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| The Rustar |
