Tuesday, August 4, 2015

Sunday, November 23, 2014 - Fujairah, UAE


During the night we traveled through the rest of the Persian Gulf, thru the Strait of Hormuz, and into the Gulf of Oman.  There are oil ships EVERYWHERE on the horizon.  There are so many it is really unbelievable.   Tim went to run on the deck and had caviar and champagne for breakfast.  I had breakfast up in the buffet near the pool and then went back to the spa to use the dry sauna again.  That hot air helps my head a lot.

We went to lunch early at 11 am since we have to meet our tour a little after noon.  Our tour is a desert safari.  We met our guide, Arun from India, in a Toyota Land Cruiser and we had only 4 of us in the vehicle – Sheila and Allan from the UK.  They were great travel companions and Arun was a fun driver.  I kept pulling his leg!
From our cabin we could see the vans lining up for our "desert safari"

We stopped at a camel shed while the drivers let a lot of the air out of the tires

Curious camels!

And a baby camel too!

We drove up through the mountains and then reached the desert.  There were 75 vehicles in the caravan.  We stopped for a picture opportunity with camels.  While we did that the drivers all let out half of the air in the tires on the vehicles – hmmmm – wonder why they are doing that!

We then set off into the dunes and WHAT AN ADVENTURE THAT WAS!  Up and down and around and twisting and sliding and a roller-coaster ride through the dunes.  Exhilarating!  I kept talking to Arun and Sheila, Allan, and Tim told me NOT to distract him!  Funny.
Barren land out in the desert outside of Fujairah, UAE

We were in a caravan headed into the sand dunes

You can see how deep into the sane the vehicles sunk - it was fun

Up and down STEEP dunes

Yippee!!!!

Some were very, very steep

We drove all over the dunes

Some interesting rock structures in the desert - but nothing much growing

Our caravan stopped for refreshments in the desert

Beautiful rock formations - Camel Rock

Tim enjoying the desert at Camel Rock

Up, down, and around the dunes - great fun!

A fun day in the desert

We climbed part of the way up the rock

Our caravan with the small town in the distance

It was so much fun, but I’m really not sure why our Land Cruiser didn’t turn over.  We stopped at “Camel Rock”, we stopped at Fossil Rock and we watched the other vehicles go over the crazy ride we had just experienced.  It was fun.

We made a stop for the rest rooms after leaving the dunes and the drivers re-inflated the tires.  We made one last stop at a “watering hole” that didn’t have much water in it.  Then we headed back to Fajairah.  A fun day.
Reinflating the tires with portable pumps that run off of the car batteries

Reinflating all of the tires after the dune safari

Arun, from India, was our driver - he LOVES what he does

A mosque at the rest stop - we saw these all over

The barren mountains

A watering hole that was mostly dried up

Desolate country at the watering hole

We had a coffee and cookie and then checked out the dinner menus.  We went to the Observatory Lounge and had a drink until after 6.  They politely asked us to leave as “they have a dress code” after 6 pm and I was in shorts!  Whoops!

We came back to the cabin and showered and dressed for dinner.  We are going to try the Italian restaurant up on Deck 11 tonight if we can get in.  We went back to the Observatory Lounge and by now they had drawn ALL of the window curtains.  One of the waiters told us that they had to do this all over the ship “because of the pirates”.  Incredible!  The ship is lit up like a Christmas tree and none of the shades in the restaurants are drawn.  So the “Observation Lounge” in not such a good place to “observe”!  We got on the list for the Italian restaurant and they called us in the lounge in about 20 minutes.

Dinner was great.  I’m still having a hard time tasting anything but dinner was filling and good.  We headed back to the room about 10 and went to bed since we have an early morning and tour.  Tonight we sail from Fujairah through the Gulf of Oman to the Arabian Sea and to Muscat, Oman.  Oman will be my 94th country visited!

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