Concord International Hotel Manama

Out of the widow Bahrain looks like lots of dust with skyscrapers on. Inside it is a strange mix of Christmas decorations lots of tour groups who look like they might be going on pilgramage, 25k rolexes in duty free, mcdonalds,costa and free internet to keep us amused. We've got 2hrs to kill - body clocks already out of sink! Am going to try and learn some nepalese from a podcast.

... it was then that I realized: I loved the desert (deep down inside), why then did I not think of making this trip before?! The bus began to accelerate and we were soon on the Riyadh highway. It was all night, and I could see cars zipping ahead. We went on for abot 200 Kms and the driver decided to make a stop at a highway restaurant. All got down, some to stretch their legs, others to grab a bit/a cool drink, or simply to take a walk around.<br><br>Soon, we were back on the ...

17/10<br>Time to be honest. We're heading home.<br>The last country is a stop-over in Bahrain (for 2 hours) as we fly through the night back to England<br>We wanted to surprise a few folks so have sneaked home quietly.<br><br>Never the less, Bahrain International Airport looked very nice at midnight, all lit up. This small island state lies in the Persion Gulf alongside saudi ...

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... having some money trouble when I left India, well I found to my delight that my card worked perfectly in Bahrain and it was a good thing it did. Feeling good, with cash in pocket I approached the taxi stand clutching an address for one of two hostels on the island kingdom of Bahrain. The place is full of big hotels I could never afford but budget accomodation is lacking. The taxi drivers all looked at the piece of paper blankly but where is it they asked ...

... put onto my room for all other purchases (ex. Minibar). I agreed, however they wanted to put 250 diners on hold on my card ($665 USD), I went through every credit card in my wallet and had a pile of declined slips on the counter of the hotel. They guy jokingly told me he was going to charge me for all the paper I used. Finally I got it through with 60 Diners on one card (I thought everything would be taken care ...

... off we went to Geant (a French supermarket chain) to pick up a shovel to dig for desert roses on our way home tomorrow. Interestingly enough, a small garden trowel was MORE expensive than a large shovel by about 70 cents. Go figure! We finished at Geant, where we also went to pick up the Bahrain mug only to find Starbucks closed, and headed for Dana Mall to see The Simpsons Movie. Homer warned us about paying to watch ...

As I sat down with a fresh squeezed orange juice in a Starbucks in Manama's financial district, I planned out what I would say in this entry, and thought of different catchy ways to start it--"they say 'timings' instead of hours," "they have McDonalds, Starbucks, AND Citibank here, all on one block," and "it's only an hour's flight from Baghdad!" crossed my mind. But I kept being distracted by the Starbucks clientele, who as usual made themselves easy targets for my lately ...

... and even shark. Everyone was trying to sell us something, and they had as much fun as we did. Many folks posed with their most interesting fish. Although none of the fish was on ice, it all looked and smelled quite fresh. After a confusing taxi ride to the south side of the city, we arrived in the neighborhood of Adlya. We were looking for the Crafts Market, but were dropped nowhere near it. We were also looking for a place called Casa Blu (suggested on virtualtraveler.com). The ...

DAY 1-2 TUE/WED Our children drove us to the airport and left us to our fate. We didn't know how much we would come to long for those fresh young faces and those who had not been able to fit in the car during the weeks ahead. During the short flight to Melbourne we were able to swap our aisle seats for a couple next to the window, though we were forced back to our allocated seats from there on. Sitting next to Margaret was a young man who was visiting his ...