Lizzie & Jarett in Dubai

A couple of weeks ago my sister Lizzie and her boyfriend Jarett came to visit me in Dubai. They were passing through on their way to Vietnam, where they will be living for possibly the next year! They managed to time their flights so that we had the whole day to spend together in Dubai.

I landed the evening before just after midnight, so after a couple of hours I went to pick them up at the airport.

Since they’d flown overnight from Vienna, and I’d only had a couple of hours sleep after my flight, we all hap a quick nap at home! They visited last year and we did most of the touristy stuff previously, so there was no real agenda for the day that we planned to follow.

We decided to go to City Walk, which is just a quick drive from where I live, for a walk around and some lunch.

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I believe that I’ve mentioned in some previous posts that the City Walk area has been updated recently and is now even bigger, with plenty of interesting areas to walk around in with painted murals, as well as shops, cafes, restaurants and a cinema.

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There is also a new attraction that has just recently opened up, called Green Planet Dubai. It’s a vertical tropical rainforest, filled with all sorts of plants and animals. Humidity inside is kept at 70%, although the temperature was slightly cooler than outside!

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It’s also home to the largest indoor. man-made and life-sustaining tree in the world (this is Dubai we’re talking about – everything has to be the biggest and the best!) which at first we didn’t realise wasn’t real. However surrounding the enormous tree are a huge selection of real plants which creep and grow all over it.

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You enter at the bottom, and take a lift up to the top. From there you work your way down all of the levels, where you can admire all of the different animal and plant exhibits.

There are also birds flying about throughout the whole dome, including beautifully coloured parrots and a toucan!

There’s also a suspension bridge, which is quite a bit wobblier than it looks!

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We made our way down all of the levels, admiring all of the pretty birds. We also spotted a couple of sloths, and some porcupines who were fast asleep.

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We were starting to feel a bit peckish, so I decided since we were in Dubai, it was only fitting to have some Arabic food for lunch. There’s only one Arabic restaurant in City Walk, Nar, so our choice was made pretty easy for us.

This was the first time that Lizzie and Jarett were trying mezze, so we picked a selection to share. Everything was absolutely delicious!

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Our choices included hummus, of course, which is the most traditional Arabic Mezze item, fattoush salad, baba ghanoush, another aubergine dish which I can’t remember the name of, falafel, as well as a lovely watermelon and halloumi salad, all accompanied by mountains of warm pita bread.

Of course we also had to try the delicious fresh lemon and mint drink which is so popular in Dubai.

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To round our lunch off, we couldn’t help but crave a little something sweet. Luckily there’s a Hummingbird Bakery just nearby so we took 3 mini cupcakes to go and made our way back to my apartment.

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Jarett was the official cupcake carrier!

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We made some cappuccinos and sat out on the balcony, chatting and catching up.

Jarett had booked his flight to Vietnam before Lizzie so they were actually flying out separately, so he had to get to the airport in the early evening. We sent him on his way, and Lizzie and I watched an episode of the Great British Bake off on the sofa!

She wanted to go for a swim, so we walked down to the pool and she had a lovely evening swim. Before long we had to make our way to the airport ready for Lizzie’s flight.

I came back home and left Lizzie, hoping that she would get on her flight (she was on standby!) and started packing, as I was off to the airport myself in the morning, to go and visit mum!

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P.s. Follow me on Instagram & Twitter for more day-to-day updates of where I am in the world! 🙂

10 Comments

  1. Jibs
    May 19, 2017 / 12:02 pm

    Hi Rachel!
    Your blog is amazing! Just started reading and I am having a good time.
    I have been to Dubai twice and I am coming in December. Can’t get enough!
    Hope to read more Dubai related posts.
    See yah!

    • thedubaidiaries
      Author
      May 25, 2017 / 11:31 pm

      Hi Jibs, thanks so much for reading! I’ll try and do some more Dubai posts although Ramadan is starting very shortly so things will be a bit quieter and lots of places will be closed for the next month. 🙂

  2. Porche
    October 30, 2016 / 8:37 pm

    Hey Rachel! Any ideas what to bid for next month?

    I think the new Fort Lauderdale would be nice treat in December!

    Quick question: Can you bid for certain flights on a particular date. Or just bid for the destination and just get any random date.

    Thanks! РPorch̩

    • thedubaidiaries
      Author
      November 1, 2016 / 9:33 pm

      Hi Porché! Still undecided what to bid for next month…any suggestions?! Will try for the new Fort Lauderdale, though I’m sure it’ll be pretty sought-after having just been launched. You can bid for a certain flight on a certain date but are more likely to get it if you don’t bid for a specific date! 🙂

      • Porche
        November 2, 2016 / 9:44 pm

        Fort Lauderdale would be amazing I say! Since its December: I would bid for the longest layover in NY possible to see all the sights at Christmas and of course Christmas shopping!! Paris or Dublin also. Or I say Moscow will be breath taking with the snow!!

        Or other more unusual places like Seoul, Oslo or the two new chinese routes!

        I’ve been reading your blog for a while but I’ve never saw that you have visited Washington. I say for your January roster bidding for that particularly with the presidential inauguration happening later in the month!

        Hope this helps with your bidding!

        Porché x

        • thedubaidiaries
          Author
          November 8, 2016 / 7:29 pm

          There needs to be more days in the month for all of those places haha! I have a week off over Christmas and will definitely be getting my yearly recurrent exams as well in December so I’m hoping that the bidding system will be able to squeeze in some of my requests! Hopefully there’ll be time for some Christmas markets in Europe 🙂 I haven’t visited Washington and I would like to but the flight eaves at a horrible time (around 2am) and is only a 24 hour layover so I won’t be bidding for it! Thanks for you suggestions 🙂 xx

  3. October 29, 2016 / 4:29 pm

    Rachel, I am sooo in love with your posts! Love the new greenhouse in Dubai – hope to visit the city soon.

    Have a great day!

    • thedubaidiaries
      Author
      November 1, 2016 / 8:53 pm

      Thanks so much! Glad you’re still enjoying reading my posts 🙂

  4. ildikó
    October 29, 2016 / 3:40 pm

    hi rachel!

    absolutely loving your blog!! 😀
    just out of curiosity, what is the oldest cabin crew member you have seen operating a flight? i know its difficult to guess age, but do you think she (or he) was over 40yo? or even 50?

    thank you bye 🙂

    • thedubaidiaries
      Author
      November 1, 2016 / 8:52 pm

      Hi Ildiko! Thanks for reading 🙂 I just had a purser who was for sure over 45 (she told us herself, although didn’t mention a specific number haha!) so there are actually plenty of “older” crew in their late 40s/ early 50s! xx

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