Good Times in the Desert...

Last night was our Desert Safari, and we were all quite pleasantly surprised by how awesome it was. Often these things can be a bit lame, so we came in with relatively low expectations and proceeded to be quite impressed by how well-run this tour is (arranged by FunTours Dubai: "We put the Fun in Tours"...). Our driver picked us up at the apartment and drove us about an hour outside of town where we met up with the rest of the safari-goers. When we piled back into the 4x4s to get things started, a super-cool chick (originally from Serbia but living in the US for 7 years now) joined us and definitely added to our enjoyment of the evening as we all hung out together for the rest of the safari. I'm feeling uncharacteristically short on words this fine morning, so hopefully Stanley and Alicia can help me out with their own account of what went down over at salazmeyer.

First up was the dune bashing portion of the safari, which is sort of like a roller coaster only with less idea of what's going to happen next. Totally awesome. I've posted a video below in an attempt to give a sense of it, but it's difficult to really convey the awesomeness. Stanley and Alicia are now more convinced than ever that they would like to get themselves a 4x4 for some desert exploration.

After the dune bashing came the camel rides (in which you sit on a camel's back while he is led in a small circle) as the sun began to set. When you'd had enough of looking at the camels, you could head down to the camp area where you had access to free shisha (aka Hubbllee Bubblee, apparently...), henna painting, sand skiing (seriously anti-climactic), arabic coffee, and soft drinks, along with a reasonably priced cash bar. I enjoyed my shisha-smoking much more this time (I think being surrounded by fresh air rather than in a closed room sitting 2 feet from a man chain-smoking cigarettes helped with that), and can now see why my brother is such a fan.

The buffet dinner was actually quite good as far as such things go, and was followed by a belly dancing performance. This was fairly entertaining, particularly at the end when a large portion of the audience joined the belly dancer on stage for a dancing free-for-all, including a few guys trying to break-dance on the carpeted stage. There is now a video of that, including Stanley shaking his groove thing with the always-lovely Alicia, over at salazmeyer.

We only signed on for the evening safari (as opposed to the overnight) in part because we lacked the minimum number of people for the overnight, but mostly because it sounded good to experience the desert for a while but then head home to sleep in our soft comfy beds... In summary: This was a really fun night and something I know I'll remember for a long time. I'm heading to the US tomorrow night, and this was a great way to celebrate my last weekend here... Today we'll be mostly staying close to home, cooking up some yummy brunch and then a bit of a Seafood Extravaganza for dinner... Hard to believe how fast my time here has gone. It still sort of feels like I just got here...