Mum comes to stay!

The morning after I landed from Hong Kong it was straight back to the airport….this time to pick up Mum! She’d flown out overnight to visit for a couple of days. As it was around 7am we went to my apartment for a cup of tea and a quick snooze. As it happened Dad’s flight got changed and he ended up having a layover in Dubai! So we popped over to his hotel to admire the views from his room on the 40th floor, and most importantly get some sun at the pool.

We ended up staying most of the afternoon just lounging by the pool, relaxing and swimming. 

After a while Mum and I walked back to my apartment to get ready for a trip to the Dubai mall. Dad stayed at his hotel to get some work done and arranged to meet us later for dinner. Mum was in search of a ball dress for my little brother’s high school graduation ball, and after browsing many shops and trying on quite a lot of dresses, we finally found one!

Dad came over and I cooked dinner and we had a very lovely evening!

The next morning we decided to go and get some more sun, this time on the beach. My airline gives us free access to lots of hotel pools and beaches, however when we arrived at the Westin (our first choice) it was apparently a public holiday so no free entrance! Luckily there’s another hotel just down the road which we can use, so we headed on over there.

After roasting in the sun and swimming alongside plenty of jellyfish in the sea we had a quick dip in the pool before heading back to mine to get ready for a surprise treat that I had planned!

Mum still had no idea where we were going and we soon pulled up to the beautiful Palace Downtown Hotel for….. Afternoon Tea!

Lovely views from the huge windows inside the Al Bayt lounge, where afternoon tea is served.

After choosing which type of tea we’d like, our waitress brought over two towering stands full of exquisite sandwiches, cakes and pastries, and most importantly, scones with jam and cream!

We slowly made our way through it all, only leaving a couple of scones to take home with us.

Once we’d finished, we had a stroll around the grounds of the hotel and admired the towering Burj Khalifa.

Anyone for shisha?

We then crossed over the bridge at Souk al Bahar for another walk around the mall. We may or may not have stopped at Laduree for some macarons to eat later…. 🙂

We decided to go to the cinema as almost all of the films are in English. (Mum and Dad live in Austria so almost all of the films they see at the cinema are in German).

Even though we were still stuffed from the afternoon tea we sat outside for some dinner overlooking the fountains and the Burj. We managed to watch 4 separate lots of the fountains, each with a different song!

On Mum’s last morning we woke up early and headed down to the marina.

I had originally planned on a walk around the Marina Walk, however for some reason a lot of it was boarded up or had scaffolding covering it. So we found a cafe serving breakfast and sat down in the shade. Even at 10am it was over 35 degrees! Summer has most definitely arrived in Dubai!

The cafe we chose was located right next to the Dhow boat station (along with lots and lots of expensive yachts!) and we decided spontaneously to go for a boat tour. We ended up being the only passengers on there! 

The trip took us along the marina, one side of The Palm, down JBR and back to the marina.

The girl working on the boat insisted on taking lots of pictures of us 😀

At one point we sailed right past the SkyDive Dubai runway and we saw lots of parachuters floating down.

Before we knew it it was time to get back to mine, have a quick dip in the pool and for Mum to pack her bags.

We made it to the airport just in time for her flight and she got the last seat!

Thanks for coming Mum! 🙂

P.s. If you want more regular day to day updates of what’s going on in my life, follow me on Twitter and Instagram @rachelwwilson!