Längerer Beitrag – schneller Überblick:
Sri Lanka and Dubai - Many new impressions keep us awake!
The day starts at the airport, we are lying between many other travellers and are quite cold. The airport is cooled down quite a bit and we are not used to this, as we usually only had a fan in the room, which was always sufficient for us.
We are tired. We are freezing and just hope that our plane is on time. And yes, it is!
We get on and if I'm honest, I don't know which of us slept first. I, for one, can't even remember the take-off. I was already fast asleep on the tarmac.
Four hours later we land in Dubai, thanks to the time difference it is shortly after 8 here. Our luggage stays right in Dubai at the airport. The four of us have a small backpack with the most important things for one night. That is enough for us.
At the airport, we are met by a German-speaking private guide who takes us on a 4-hour tour of Dubai. Still a little tired, we let ourselves be driven through the city in a van, stopping here and there for photo stops and are overwhelmed. Overwhelmed by the many superlatives, by the huge buildings, by the political and economic situation and above all by the cleanliness. After 4 hours we are already exhausted, but no less enthusiastic. Dubai is a really great city. Interesting, artificial, beautiful, much quieter, with quiet street traffic and somehow so very different from anything I have ever seen. Especially after Sri Lanka!
Around noon, the guide takes us to the Dubai Mall, the biggest shopping centre in the world (as everything here is somehow the biggest, best... something...) and we join the short queue for the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world. We had ordered the tickets online and everything works out wonderfully easy. The lift "hurls" us upwards at breakneck speed, about 10 metres per second. And we don't notice a thing. Not a thing. Suddenly we are on the 124th floor and have a magnificent view and overview of the artificial city. Everything here, really everything, used to be desert. The whole city is either built on sand (desert) or on water, formerly sea. We are fascinated, thrilled and a little irritated at the same time. We can't grasp it all.
After being "hurled" down again, Gerd and I let everything sink in over a coffee, while the kids stroll through the mall. We skip the desert tour and instead treat ourselves to the Dubai Fountain with classical Arabic music directly under the Burj Khalifa.
By now we are completely overtired and exhausted, so we take a taxi and are driven to the hotel. Here we stay only for a short while - just don't go to bed, otherwise the evening is over - and then on to dinner. Again in a mall. Too bad, we were more in the mood for a quaint atmosphere. The kids actually want to go to a market again, but our strength fails us, so we walk back to the hotel and fall into bed. We can't remember who slept first. I think we were all in a deep sleep within seconds. The still full-bodied idea that we all wanted to take a shower didn't turn into anything for any of us. That will have to wait until tomorrow morning.
Shownotes: https://www.leben-pur.ch/018-sri-lanka-und-dubai-viele-neue-eindruecke-halten-uns-wach/
Info:
Our hotel in Dubai: Phoenix
