Ramee International Manama

Not much - just waiting at the airport for the flight! Bahrain was both nicer and more boring than I thought, the weather is a lot more forgiving but it's not worth more than about 3 days exploration tops.. Unless you like to get really nittygritty :P

Apparently the Bahrain-Saudi border is on a little island [not sure if it has an official name], which hosts a rest point on either side of the border, complete with matching observation towers. The whole road, which is 45km long, is called the King Fahad Causeway on the Bahraini side, with a different Saudi name.. Interesting stuff! :) Due to it being Ramadan and us not being ...

... wanting to come into Bahrain and next to nothing going into Saudi - apparently it's easier to access alcohol in Bahrain! :P

Our last stop was the Bahrain Fort [aka Portuguese Fort]. Nothing particularly new to me, seen plenty of them, but it was weird knowing the whole area it was on was reclaimed land from the sea!

Today, my mum had a conference so I was left to do as I pleased. I had a walk around the Juffair neighbourhood which was where my hotel was ...

... but needed to know the time of the Felix flight I could catch in Sana'a.  She said there flights practically hourly, but I knew this was not true, knowing how few flights there are in Yemen (especially for Yemenia) and that there was a Felix flight to Seiyun slightly later than my Yemenia flight, which I would also miss (having been inadvertently been offered this flight by a Yemeni tour operator).  She made a call to another Yemenia rep.

We ended up sitting there in the mostly ...

... Want Me," Kanye (Kanye West), Lenny Kravitz, and other songs that seemed to be from growing up in the 90's---only one song that seemed to be from Europe). Once into Khobar, I was staring out the window at the people along the corniche. All I saw were shorts (which LP had strongly advised not to wear---come on, it was only written in 2007---it can't be that outdated) and jeans on those picnicking, walking, eating, and playing with their kids (at a playground). Again, mostly men ...

... also go from red to yellow to green. If you don't start driving when the light turns from red to yellow, other drivers honk at you -- keep in mind that elsewhere in the intersection, some other driver is speeding through a light turning from yellow to red. It's all very sane. The food has been quite good here. We had a wonderful Iranian meal at the Gulf Hotel on Thursday night: kebabs (my favorite was minced lamb), various types of rice, mast-o-khiya (almost identical to ...

Thursday, September 20, 2007 Today was a good day. After our four-hour drive to Bahrain and then touring before shopping, we were wiped. It showed when we didn't even wake up until Colin turned on the T.V. at 8 A.M. Needless to say, it was a great sleep. After lazing around a bit we headed up to James' apartment and had a great breakfast of bacon (real pork!), eggs, pancakes, yogurt, and toast. Yes, PORK! The little supermarket ...

... was okay except no bacon (I don't count beef bacon). Driving is different to Doha. People wait at roundabouts and give way to others. I found myself impatient as I am so used to slotting in to any available space and just flooring it. They also have some pretty roundabouts. Most streets are good except when you go in to the older part of town - just drive and keep your wits about you. Don't worry about cars coming straight at you on the wrong ...

... ones, but not very good for the middle east), cheese, Foul, lebneh, and strong coffee. They also had western-style eggs, potatoes, and sausage. There are three bus stations within walking distance of the hotel, so we tried to figure out what goes where. Schedules are posted along with destinations, but nothing resembling a map. The information is pretty ambiguous, and things that people told us did not make much sense to us, although we've probably sorted out the main ones we need ...

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 ...