Dubai!

At the end of March we had the opportunity to go on our biggest family adventure to date...an eleven day trip to DUBAI!!!  It was an amazing trip and pictures (we took over 1000 on our camera, not to mention the pics on three cell phones!) just do not do it justice.  The best words to describe it were actually told to the kids and I by our cab driver one day...Dubai is "too much fun"!

We left Jacksonville on March 28 and set off for a 15 hour flight to Dubai.  Some of us handled it better than others (no comment!), but all in all it wasn't as bad as it sounds and I think that we would all agree that we would do it again today if it meant we could go back to Dubai.  Here are just some of the wonderful places we visited on our trip...

The word for "market" is Souk and there were souks everywhere in Dubai! The first night we went to an amazing place for dinner and a little shopping called the Souk Madinat Jumeirah. It was breathtakingly beautiful.

Our first view of the Burj Al Arab at night.  Stunning!

Our first hotel in Dubai was the very oppulent Metropolitan Palace.  It was over the top with marble, crystal and gold everywhere!

Eveywhere we went we found a different souk.  Some of these markets were very old and authentic and some were very new and modern, but created with the old feel.  We visited the souk in Old Dubai and it was like stepping back in time.  This old area sits across the river from the very modern high rise buildings and was such a contrast between old and new.  We crossed the river on an "abra" which is a little wooden boat.

The Gold Souk is several city blocks wide and filled with everything made of gold that you can imagine.  Never have I seen so much gold jewelry or gold bars in one place.  It was a little overwhelming just to look at it all!

In addition to gold, the Gold Souk also had silver bars, watches and lots of other jewelry for sale.

As we continued walking through the Gold Souk, we ended up in the middle of the Textile Souk.  It was close to midnight by this time and the place was filled with people shopping at this late hour.  Emory had a little fun getting dressed up in traditional arabic headgear by one of the vendors.

The architecture in Dubai was incredible.  There are new buildings at every turn and they are building more sky skrapers all the time.  Dubai currently has the tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa.  During the day when the sun is so bright it is honestly hard to look all the way to the top.

Every night in the pools outside of the Burj Khalifa, the fountains put on a show set to music every half an hour.  It's beautiful!  We were lucky enough to see it five times one evening during a long, relaxing dinner.

Incredible architecture, both old and new, can be seen everywhere.  The Burj Al Arab is the iconic symbol of Dubai.  It sits on it's own small manmade island.

Mosques can be found in the middle of the city tucked between the office buildings.

The malls in Dubai are like none the we have ever seen.  They are huge and have every store imaginable.  Many of the stores were from other countries and so super high end  that we had never heard of but enjoyed checking out.  The malls are not only for shopping though.  It's so hot for such a large part of the year in Dubai that the malls have all sorts of indoor entertainment.  They have indoor aquariums, ice skating rinks and mega kids entertainment area like Sega World and even indoor snow skiing!  Here we are in front of the three story waterfall wall that was inside of the Dubai Mall.

The kids and I visited the Dubai Aquarium one day while Dan was working.  It was huge!  They had a huge penguin exhibit in the Aquarium that Emory especially loved.

This was the cutest penguin!  He would follow your hand anywhere that you moved it on the glass.  The kids both loved it and could have stayed there for hours if it weren't so darn cold in there!

Only in Dubai can you find snow skiing in a mall located in the desert!  Amazing!  We visited Ski Dubai one afternoon and were not disappointed.   They had real snow inside with a few different level ski runs and a play area with toboggans, innertubes to ride down hills on and even a huge inflatable ball that you climbed inside of and rolled down the hill in.  Ellie loved it!

More penguins!

As we left we were able view of this massive ski structure from the outside of the mall.

No trip to Dubai would be complete without a ride through the desert in a 4x4 which is called dune bashing, followed by a ride on a camel, a belly dancer show and a bbq dinner.  It was all "too much fun" but the kids might tell you that their favorite part was climbing up and running back down all of the sand mountains in the desert!

My favorite part of the evening was without a doubt the camels. 

The next part of our trip was all about just hanging out, having fun and relaxing.  We had two wonderful nights at The Atlantis on The Palm Jumeirah.  The Palm is a manmade island in the shape of a palm tree.  Only in Dubai!

Another huge aquarium...

We enjoyed lots of great meals and drinks in an absolutely perfect atmosphere.

One morning we took advantage of the kyaks and paddle boats at the resort but quickly found it was so hot out on the water that we couldn't last for long in the scorching desert sun.  You can really see how large this place is from the water.

Next we were off to cool off a bit at the waterpark.

The water park at the Atlantis was the best!  It had the most incredible lazy river that wasn't exactly lazy.  It had rapids and the neatest thing called water escalator in the lazy river to take you up hill to the top so you were always moving.  The most famous water ride is the Leap of Faith and Emory, Ellile and Dan were up for the challenge.

First Emory took the leap...

followed by Ellie who screamed the entire way down and decided that it would be fun to try and sit up half way down!  Crazy girl!

...then Dan.

We visited Atlantis the week before Easter so the resort was all decorated with eggs and chicks, even in a country that doesn't celebrate Easter.  It was a nice surprise since we weren't expecting to see any chicks or bunnies.

 There was a special Easter shop full of huge eggs made entirely of chocolate.  Yum!

Even this huge egg was made of real chocolate!

On the last day of our visit to Atlantis, the kids and I swam with the dolphins at Dolphin Bay.  We swam with a three year old dolphin named Lexi and she was so sweet and gentle.  I don't think any of us stopped smiling the entire time!

Our last day in Dubai we went to Jumeirah Beach to see the beach, do some shopping and have a relaxing lunch before our long flight home later that evening.  It was a great area of Dubai and definitely where I would like to spend more time on our next visit :o)

 There were camel rides available on the beach.

Just a couple of days after we left, the Red Bull Motocross races were coming to Jumeirah Beach.

Emory loved all of the expensive cars that we saw in Jumeirah Beach and all over Dubai.  They were everywhere you turned!

Our flight out of Dubai was on a Saturday night but with the 15 hour flight and the time change while flying, we ended up getting home on Easter Sunday.   It's a great thing when the airport gift shops carry chocolate bunnies!

Dubai was an amazing place to visit and somewhere that we would definitely like to visit again if we get the chance.  We have so many great memories of this country and can't wait to see where our next adventure will take our family!