Dubai: Camel Markets, fancy shopping malls and sandcastle forts

We spent an evening and a day in Dubai. For this leg, Bill let us rent a car so we could visit some stuff outside of town. It seemed like a good idea at the time but ended up sort of kicking our butt:  lots of traffic, major problems finding parking and we got a soft tire and had to stop twice to get air put in it.

But it did give us some mobility so first thing in the morning we headed out to Al Ain, an oasis town about 2 hours from Dubai.  We had to visit the Al Ain fort which looks like a sandcastle fort. 

Also made a stop at the Camel Souk where they buy and sell camels.

This baby camel was putting up quite a fight (and was making loud honking noises) to be sold away from its mother.  Made me so sad.

And in the middle of the market, there was a dead camel. Just lying there. Everyone stepping over it. Like it was nothing. 

As an aside, Jordan has shown a stunning ability to sleep - ANYWHERE.  And I mean ANYWHERE.

Then we headed to a fancy, fancy, fancy mall where we had to ski on the indoor ski slope.  That's right .... an indoor ski slope with ski lift and everything.  It was such fun.

Followed by a swim in the Arabian sea. Only one team member had to get wet so the Raineys and Angel took the salty, sandy experience for 50 points.

My friend from childhood (Sonia) now lives in Dubai.  She moved here a few years ago from London.  So at the end of the leg, she came over to our hotel and had dinner with us and we got to catch up.  It was so nice to see her. 

We are now off to Budapest, Hungary... another new country for me (YAY).  We were supposed to  have a 7 hour lay-over scavenge leg in Istanbul but - for the very first time - we hit a difficult travel obstacle:m 3 teams got bumped off our plane from Dubai to Budapest.  The airline re-routed them and they should arrive in Hungary just a few hours after us but it messed up our plans somewhat.  Plus we arrived late into Istanbul so it would have been more like a 4 hour leg here - and the airport is 45 minutes from town - so Bill just canceled the leg.  Instead of eating Turkish delight and getting a Hamam bath experience, I'm sitting in an airport cafe blogging and waiting for our connection to Budapest. 

Budapest will be the start of the Europe leg which is typically a multi-day leg where we have to travel - by ourselves and with all of our luggage - for 4 or 5 days over a series of European countries.  Not sure yet what route we'll be on... but stay tuned and I'll let you know.