I've never flown Emirates before - and without trying to sound too much like a commercial - our Paris to Dubai fight was amaazing (the Dubai to Thiruvananthapuram was a whole different Emirates story). Although we just flew economy on the first flight we got hot towels, personal tablet screens with thousands of movies, games, streaming music, radio, podcasts, a menu of food choices, as much 'free' alcohol as desired, and quite a bit more personal space than I'm used to on American planes. We were pretty giddy for the first hour of flight. ;) After a groggy two hour drive back to Charles de Gaulle after our night of wedding-partying - we hardly slept a bit and were pretty much zombies by the time we hit the Asian continent, but adrenaline + a new place helped us hop along. The United Arab Emirates is wonderfully open to short-term visitors (unfortunately my America does not return the hospitality) and so we checked our carry-ons at the airport for about 20 Dirhams/bag, jumped on Dubai's simple metro, and explored the city's famous-massive mall, it's record breaking aquarium, Burj Khalifa (the world's tallest building) and some lovely Lebanese foods across the street. It was a dizzying vision of one of the most extreme landscapes I've seen in my life. Glorious skyscrapers rose before my very eyes as every view writhed with construction. Turquoise pools with (again) record breaking fountains were lined with lush greenery all set against the sandy pits of undeveloped desert parcels. So many contrasts, my sleepy brain couldn't figure a thing. Everything's huge. It's probably good we spent most of our visit oohhing at tanked sea creatures. ;) I remain bewildered. Check out more details @ thedubaimall.com where their slogan is "Everything You Desire," how could one resist?! Only if you're planning on visiting for short or long, be sure to reserve your tickets to the top of the tower, we didn't quite figure out that requirement until it was too late for our day (and our bodies too probably). Either way I'm certainly hoping to stop back again and try to clear up some of my confusion. ;D
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AuthorAn Upstate New York-grown, art history + Italian major turned organic farm volunteer turned Home Health Aide turned Landscape Architecture Grad student currently adventuring about the globe and taking far too many photos for one travel blog to handle. Archives
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