Tulip Inn Al Rahba Abu Dhabi

... us new teachers stayed the night at the Abu Dhabi Hilton—very beautiful, right along the coast of the Persian Gulf.

August 6th, still jet lagged and recovering from the heat, Chad and I were whisked off to a hotel Liwa; a small city in the middle of the desert just a short drive from the Saudi border. At the time, we had no car, and no taxis dared wander into the lonely red sand dunes of Liwa, a far distance from roads, towns, and people. We were essentially captive to our ...

... get boarding passes, go through multiple low-tech security screens, have immigration officers inspect and stamp our our scraps of paper and passports, and then wait in long lines to board.  We were delighted to actually board... Rest of blog posting is at www.changeinplans.net

... all the same as the made appearances on various peoples heads on the photos and even joined in the surprise Happy Birthday rendition to Bellie and Little Al sung by the waiters. With the "falcons" finished it was time to head to another hotel and a bar called Cheebas, where quite a few more drinks were consumed, but more amusingly we actually met an Arab guy who said he owned 3 falcons and could arrange for us to see them. To be honest the guy seemed a bit dodgy to me ...

... sitting next to me (who seconds before was in a deep sleep) bounded over me and went to assist. The guy ended up being OK, but needed oxygen and the nurse to hold his airways open for then next couple of hours. I think it was just a clevor ruse to get himself moved into a first class bed! One other thing, what's with the Philipino trolley dollies on an Emirates flight? Hey Emir! So close and yet so far... How's life in Riyad?

... blog by someone who quite unashamedly has no intention of fully exploring the place she is in, is unusual indeed. Although I like to think that the glimpses of Abu Dhabi that I do have to offer are real nuggets of experience and may even tell you a lot more about this place than an earnest description (even if interlaced with historical fact) about the Fort or erm....other tourist places which I haven´t discovered. The ...

... drive it in fact I don't get to drive it much at all secretly I think Eddy is thinking that E Stachow means Eddy Stachow. Life in Abu Dhabi is a lot quieter than we are used to. Eddy has made a couple of golfing friends and now that the weather is cooling down, last week it went below 30 for the first time at it appears that it will stay below 30 he is able to get out and about to golf. However golf is pretty ...

... down in the corridor, against the wall, beyond the security checkpoint. The guy didn't like that but since we weren't exactly not allowed to be there, he only made a few half hearted attempts to move us on. Poor guy never stood a chance; me and the two women had bonded and the mischief was strong with us. They were both South Africans from Kimberley so we spoke about my time in Benoni and then moved on to other topics. The whole thing gave me my second wind and for a while I ...

... him, I should have a problem in the 12 hours before my next flight. It was nice of him though. The drive to the hotel - now with the name the Golden Tulip - was really nice. Date palms and signs in Arabic scrawl, square pastel houses with wooden struts sticking out the side, and sand! Sounds stupid, but the place is so flat and sandy. Love it. We passed a huge mosque - the Sheikh Zayed Mosque, second biggest in the world after Mecca - truly beautiful lit up at night! The ...

... like a typical man and so we headed to the other side only to be told by the bus driver of the bus we thought was it that we were in fact on the wrong side and had spent 20 minutes watching the right buses pass right in front of us on the other side. So with my tail between my legs I headed back over to the other side. Once there Andrea quickly reminded me, just in case I had forgotten, that we had been on the right side and that we had missed the bus twice...OOPS!!! So we waited ...

... the big sail looking building that Dubai's famous for). We stopped for a delish bite at a café owned by two Aussie chicks before we trekked across the hot scoulding sand to the public beach for a dip. The beach was pretty empty other than some scantily clad women, a bunch of local guys salivating next to them and rubbing their ******es, a group (or swarm) of 15 local boys with no understanding of personal space when swimming at the beach and a guy we ...