Deira creek in Dubai could be one of good option to spend the afternoon & evening, especially now when it's winter time, oh we're talking about Dubai, so the winter time here is only around at least 17-19 degrees celcius, so temperature is still normal, anyway start with taking a walk by the creek where you can see the fisherman's daily life, then not too far from there there's like cafetaria where you can nibble on Samosa(indian pastry)or Shawarma accompanied with Coconut drink or something, then just in front of this shop, you'll see lines of Abra(local wooden boat) that float and park there waiting for passangers, hop yourself there and enjoy the ride even it's pretty short as it's only crossing from one side(from Deira) to the other(to Bur Dubai) but it's still quite pleasant to sit there and watch the "traffic" on the creek and you got the breeze all the way. Seagull are normally flying around the creek and they could fly quite close to the abra too, this could be a good scene ;) On the evening time, there's Dinner Cruise with lights all over their boat, it looks lovely and with huge window around, so u can take a wild guess how they're having their steak that night :D Once you reach the other side of the creek, called Bur Dubai, hop off there and u're at typical arabic market, we call it here Souq(arabic word for market) that has many different shops which sells from fabric to fake branded watch and even blackmarket branded parfume, which just come in a bottle, without any packaging(that's why it's quite cheap :D, well at least this is what i got :)Perhaps it's just been off loaded from the ship so this smuggling thing like this is just normal here? btw, nearby the souq there's a cozy cafe where normally people sipping on nice Maroccoan tea as well smoking shisha. It's a cozy place to sit and at the same time you can enjoy the scenery of the boats that's slowly passing by. This place indeed far from the glamorous impression of Dubai, I feel this place look more real and simple, totally opposite from the other side of the town where the tallest sky craper building or 7 star hotel are around and famous for. I hope they still keep this kind of place as I think it has more character.

This Castle is one among many Crusaders castle which were built around the 12th centuries. Built in a plateau on higher side of a hill which is 1000-m height above sea level. Located 140 miles to teh south from Amman - Jordan capital. One of the famous owner of this castle is Reynald de Chantillons who controlled the herd and trade path from and to Syria - Eqypt. Most of the castle part has been renovated and added new parts- especially in the front section. Apparently there is an archeological museum in the lower part of the hill, the samecomplex as this castle - which I didn't check. The castle extends over the southern part of the plateau. It is a notable example of Crusader architecture, a mixture of European, Byzantine, and Arab designs. Its walls are strengthened with rectangular projecting towers, long stone vaulted galleries are lighted only by narrow slits, and a contains a deep moat from the west which completely isolates the site.

This was the first real stop after 4 hours driving trip from Madaba. The crusader castle which is built in the town which is now also called Karak. It is lying on the side of the hill with 2 valleys made a triangle shape. The castle can be spotted from afar – even from the previous hill before we’re near to the town. The hill was black and this castle is built from white rock.

The guide drove us to the main street passing the town and went on the back side of the castle (or was it the proper front side), which there is a small street looks like the old part of the town. This street was crowded with housing areas and vehicles, made it a bit difficult to get a parking lot

Anyway – I jumped out of the car, stretched my back and start wandering around the castle.

As some tourist sites in Jordan has fooled me with their unimpressive front appearance, but once I have passed the ticket counter and souvenirs section and start to see the real part of the site, again my jaw dropped and I took my first opinion backJ. So this also happened with Shobak castle. I was more and more interested with the white ruins and gravel base everywhere. The main castle was built in half circle shaped and inside there are some stairs down or turn to other part of the main path, some empty rooms and small closet like which has opening on the roof. There is some stair going down to other path on the lower ground.

They have decent bathrooms which is located in front of the souvenirs shops on the way out and also a decent look restaurant on the entrance.

The castle itself is not so huge, but has several interesting and secluded part with some ruins.

From one of the castle we can see almost the whole part of the valley – some said that if the visibility is good we can see as far as Dead Sea. We wandered around the castle for 2 hours – most of the building was very dark inside with gavels everywhere.

Shobak is a crusader castle which was built in 12 centuries, located on the north east of Shobak town on top of a small hill. It was also known by the name of Krak de Montreal or Mont Regalis (named after the king who contributed on the construction – Mont Royal), built by Baldwin King to protect the Salah Eddin attack from Eqypt. It finally fell to Salah Eddin and deteriorated, before it went to Mamluk dynasty hand around 14 centuries. This site was mostly destroyed and currently has been reconstructed. It has 2 churches, one located at the entrance with its cisterns and small baptistery. This castle is built from white rock as other Jordan’s site and has the main structure of round long path resembles a crescent. Inside of the castle it was dark with not enough opening to get more natural daylight with gravel spread everywhere. There were some ruins which are suspected were baths, cisterns and rainwater pipes. They have restored most of the building. The entrance was a bit secluded on the back side of the hill. With a tall wall and heavy wooden door. We went in and start wandering from the first small hills. This castle is huge - built of white-calcite rocks, as it is built on a hilly surface, the structure also follows the height of the hill. There are different - slightly separate part and separate rooms. The interesting part is the rounded pavillions which looks like a church. One great thing from thsi castle is prior the entrance (depends on your guide) there is an alternative -secret entrance which you will have to climb down from a small stair - our guide lied to us that that to get into the castle we had to take this way:). He said that this small path will lead us to the main castle - but we didn't continue the journey as it was so dark inside. One impressive thing from this castle - the difference in height of its part shown that they really have built a huge castle with different purposed-rooms. As another castle - it has a part which we can see afar tomiles and miles away.

Breaky at IKEA? why not! tempted by the ad in the newspaper, for the whole portion of only 5 AED!! that is not even 2USD!! you got 2 sausages, scramble eggs, hash brown, baked beans or sautee mushroom. this is quite good price isn't it? Though Dubai is known as expensive place and always offer all about posh fine dining and luxury restaurant, apparently in a furniture empire like IKEA, they can still serve quite good breaky with very affordable price. oh and if you add 4 AED for coffee or tea, u can have how many refill urself(make urself at home as it's self-service) It mentioned also in the newspaper that IKEA Cafetaria Dubai has been chosen as an example of highest hygiene standard at a restaurant following surprise visits conducted by Dubai Municipality inspectors. So, whoever lives in Dubai or visiting Dubai, try to grab this good deal offer at IKEA Dubai Festival City :D

Now that summer is over, what a nice temperature to go and spend a day at the beach :) so me and my roomie jasmine(Jas_jm24)  decided to hit the beach yesterday afternoon and planned to stay until sunset. Good thing the beach is just walking distance from our place, how lucky lol.

Was indeed a nice sunny day, not too hot with sea breeze and calm water. it was Friday so of course beach was pretty busy, we just chose to sit in the corner not to close to the crowd.

Hmmm i guess in Dubai there's more than just malls... malls and malls...

Vielen Dank an dieser Stelle fuer die zahlreichen guten Wuensche, die Schutzengel und die kreativen Abschiedspraesentli! Ich habe mich sehr darueber gefreut und das Abschied nehmen fiel mir nicht immer leicht. 

Nach 6 Stunden Flug und 1 Stunde schlaf bin ich nun fuer eine Nacht in der Wueste angekommen. Weil meine pensionierte Sitznachbarin die wunderbare Idee hatte, bei jedem zweiten Lied der Boardunterhaltung mitzusingen, bestaunte ich dank Fensterplatz das mystische Schauspiel der brennenden Oelraffinerien in den Wuesten Iraks und Kuwaits. Sah fantastisch aus und doch war ich froh, dieses Gebiet in ausreichender Hoehe ueberfliegen zu koennen.

In Dubai wollte ich natuerlich das Burj Al Arab (Segelhotel) anschauen gehen. Weil ich dafuer den oeffentlichen Bus und nicht die Touribuse benutzte, war das von A nach B kommen meine erste grosse Herausforderung dieser Reise. Was habe ich gelernt? Nicht in jedem Scheich, steckt ein ortskundiger Scheich! Denn dank ihm (Passagier Mohammed Busreihe 18), stuende ich vermutlich noch jetzt am Strassenrand und wuerde auf meinen Anschlussbus warten. :-) Netterweise rief mich der Buschauffeur zurueck, der sich wunderte, warum ich denn an dieser Station X bereits umsteigen wollte. Wichtig, Mann nicht im vorderen Bereich des Buses absitzen. Dieser Teil ist fuer Frauen reserviert. Andere Laender, andere Sitten! Das macht das Reisen gerade so interessant!

Das 7Stern-Hotel Bury Al Arab und das derzeit hoechste Gebaeude der Welt Burj Dubai (818 Meter) haben mich beeindruckt und der lange Strand liess erstmals Ferienfeeling aufkommen.  Ansonsten ist Dubai eine riesengrosse Baustelle und ich freue mich, morgen nach Australien weiterzuziehen. Fotos werden nachgereicht, wenn schnellere Leitung gefunden.

Es geht mir gut und ich hoffe, ihr habt es ebenso! Werde innert absehbarer Zeit ueber meine ersten Aussie-Erfahrungen berichten und gruesse euch herzlich!

Hired a driver for the day with another couple and got taken to all the main sights in Dubai, Atlantis Palace was amazing especially the aquarium inside. The Old Creek area had an interesting skyline with all the big hotels and offices. The sail hotel was not open to visitors but still managed to get photos at the gated entrance.

I travel to Dubai every couple of months and for the past year my friends and I stay at the Millenium Airport Hotel in Dubai. No matter what time we arrive we get a room without a reservation. What generally happens is that we try to decide on a hotel and end up just going to the Millenium. We usually do two beds and it costs us roughly $100 US. A few times we split the room 4 ways. They didn't seem to care that we had others staying in the room. They only gave us two keys though. They'll require a single credit card to put the room on but whenever you check out they will split it as many ways as you want. The rooms are always clean and are not overly appointed. The beds are not the most comfortable I've ever slept in but they are clean and room service will bring you as many pillows as you want. You'll probably want to request a few. The pillows are not very big or fluffy. This hotel does have one annoying thing that I really don't like about hotels but for the price it's not really worth complaining....the internet. There is a service charge by the hour or for the day. I think I tolerate the internet because we too busy boozing it up to get on the net. That brings me to another point. This hotel has two restaurants downstairs. Well actually three. The third is the restaurant lounge. Mr. Biggles is a bar that has live music often and other various social events each night. Cactus Jack's is the other. It is a mexican style restaurant with an endless flow of chips and salsa and pretty good margaritas. All in all for the money and proximity to the airport the Millenium is a good deal. Oh yeh, the airport! It's only about 5 minutes away. The hotel offers free shuttle service each way. If you don't take the shuttle from the airport don't worry the taxi's will get you there for about $5 US.

I was not so looking forward to work in Dubai until I heard I was going to work with about 70 different nationalities.  But this turned out to be just the second thing that I like when I reached the city. 

The first thing that I really like about it is the attitude that everything is possible.  It was amazing to see one of the world’s biggest projects today like the Palm Island and to witness the Grucci Team’s hard work to achieve the Guinness World Record during the grand opening of the Atlantis Hotel which is located at the crescent of the Palm.

The greeneries in South East Asia were missed when I looked at the empty sandy lot.  But that doesn’t mean its all sand everywhere.  Dubai may be a desert but it is doing best to keep the greens.  I could see beautiful flowers on my way to work every single day even in the hottest months.

Alcohol is now an acceptable part of life for the tourists in the UAE.  However, you have to have a Liquor License to be able to buy your own drinks and party at home.  If not, alcohol could only be consumed in hotels and bars like the Barasti-Le Meridien Hotel in Dubai Marina.  This is one of the most popular bars in Dubai and it was crowded when my colleagues and I went there even though it was raining.  Even a non-drinker like me would enjoy it because they have Live Music, DJ, Dance Floor, TV Sports, Sisha for those who like to smoke, seafood, lounge on the beach to soak up the sun at day time and the view of the gulf and the Palm Island is fantastic.  Plus, there is a small swimming pool but I didn’t see anyone swimming.  Perhaps, it is saved for someone very drunk!

And uh!..I found a secret. It is still possible to buy liquor without a license because one time in my door, I saw restaurant fliers and a business card indicating different kinds of liquor for sale.  But if your company provides 24/7 security, you might have someone knocking at your door to ask for your license and confiscate your drinks and not forgetting, report you to the Human Resources. 

For one year, I noticed that most motorists always stop when they see people trying to cross the road even if they are not on the pedestrian lane.   Most taxi drivers here are from Pakistan and India and they are very polite and friendly.  When I returned from Beijing, I took a taxi from the airport at around 2AM and it was really safe. 

Local married ladies are covered in black when they are in public but foreigners are free to wear skimpy shorts or skirts.  No police officer will arrest you unlike in other Arab countries.  For women travelling to the UAE, it is not a scary place.  In fact, I found it safer than other cities I have been to so far. 

During the cold months, I would always shiver while waiting for the bus.  I’ve gotten used at that so when the summer started, I had to go to Dubai mall and skate.  They have posh shopping malls here with ice rink, a ski area and even a huge aquarium with sharks. 

If you would like to see the Palm Island, I suggest that you go directly to Atlantis, The Palm where you could get to swim at the Aquaventure for only AED200.  If you don’t mind spending more, you could also swim and interact with the Dolphins.  There are different restaurants there like NOBU, Seafire, Ossiano (which has an underwater view) Saffron (my favorite and the one that I can afford J which has a huge chocolate fountain and dinner buffet is fantastic).

This is an amazing project at the crescent of the Palm island

Known as the biggest and most preserved Roman site outside Italy – this town was built in 100 BC era and known as one of Decapolis (10 cities) which held important roles in the ancient trading and civilization around what now called Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. As other part surrounded this towns, Jerash was flourished during Roman period, then Ummayad era took over and and Persian later – this has contributing some impressive remains. This site was around 800k sq meters and are very well preserved – consisting of magnificent Hadrian’s arch, hippodrome, oval forum, theaters, Zeus and Artemis temple and a fine – long colonnaded road with lots of pillars still stay still. They have a show called Chariot Race with the horses and chariot in the hippodrome – which unfortunately wasn’t on that day. You need to allocate at least half day here to be able to cover almost the whole area – and even longer if you want to really focus and see more around. One of the great spot was the top entrance of the theater as we went from top of the hill and upon entering – found out ourselves reached the top part of the rounded seats and looking to the stage down there in the middle. There is a music show held here occasionally (that explains the bagpipe I found laying there at the bottom).

After I think it was enough of ruins which amazed me – we arrived in Jerash (Gerasa). This place is going down to south from Umm Qays. We arrived here sometime in the late afternoon, felt numb after sitting so long in the car so I just jumped out and rushed to the gate. I was initially underestimate this site as what I can see from a far was a small hills and some gate – so I was thinking – arrgghh can’t believe that there is something so overrated and touristy in Jordan like this!.

Even when I crossed the small souvenirs market just down the main gate I was still grumbling and planned to explore more the market if the site disappoint me.

Which then after some minutes, I swallowed my lesson! (And proved that the ticket I bought was really worth its price!). I step on the first stairs entering the site and reached the immense Hadrian’s Arch, a huge gate built to greet Hadrian’s visit to Jerash in 106 BC. FYI that Hadrian was a Rome emperor (yeah – I just looked it up in Wikipedia:p).This gate caused me some problem in deciding which angle should I point my camera to! This arch was initially planned to be the main gate for the huge outer fence of the whole site – which apparently never be realized.

After spending some time around the gate, we moved inside and find a lot of ruined stones laying around for the restoration project and a hippodrome – where they occasionally have a chariot race/show, those which looked like in Benhur movie (or “300” movie for those younger-than-us-generation :p). Then we walked along till the end of the hippodrome to see that we arrived in oval forum – a huge open rounded space bordered with a fine columns and a long colonnaded street. This magnificent oval forum as said to be the only one found in Middle East. No wonder Jerash is known as “Pompeii of the East” as they have the most preserved and significant Roman ruins. The view from here is even more breathtaking and I can’t help to think how it was in the past when it was still all new and actively used.

I went back to find myself in a theater’s entrance – man .. how they loved theaters back then, eh! This theater was amazing as it located rather downhill from the surrounding so I didn’t enter from the proper gate – instead I went inside from an opening from the very top round seats. From there I can see the whole of the stage down there – which looks very far down there. I sacredly climbed down slowly and reached at the bottom, which then I wandered around the stage and found there was a space behind the stage. And one thing I found laying on the ground – was a bagpipe – well.. guess, Scottish are everywhere eh? Haha.

I went out from the main gate now, going out from this huge theater. Then continue to walk on the top of the hill and reached Zeum temple and then Artemis temple with their massive and impressive tall pillars. These huge pillars is said to sway slightly due to the wind – but we didn’t really proved if that’s the case when we were there. I felt like I was in a huge playground with lots of things to see and check around (now I can a bit understand the feeling of a dog:D – without “peeing your territory” part).

The hills looks very nice with a thick green grass and small summer white flowers here and there with lots of white rocks from the ruins (probably lots of unexcavated parts of the site underneath it). Then we continued to walk down the long colonnaded road towards the north. There are 2 main road – north-south and west-eat which met in a square called tetrapyllon. Existing portion of the street was bordered with columns. I can almost hear the sound of horse shoes clapping the colonnaded road – it was so time-warping feeling (as if I lived in the past!).

We walked back and finally reached the oval forum again, when the sun was started to set and gave me a beautiful sunset view from the forum.

I just wish I have more time (and spare foot) to wander more around this 800k sq meters site, as there are much more parts which I haven’t explored yet – Ummayad Mosque, another theater, some small temples – even one column can take a few minutes of my time to stare and just stare at it.

So, we went back towards the entrance and passing a new part of the site – which they had a restaurant and a nice walking area, go back to our driver who kept telling us – not to be too late inside there 3 hours ago!.

Surely I missed the souvenir market and didn’t regret it at all.

This Jerash site is located in the side of now-Jerash town, in the foot of a small hill, so the view toward the town is very nice – especially during late evening when the sun rays brighten the town.

I was just still speechless on the way back.

The second day in Jordan!

The weather was perfect, sunny and clear blue sky. We arrange a day excursion from Issa - taxi driver coordinator from Mariam Hotel. We had a huge 6 seats van for just 3 of us, with the driver. I sat in front, and within the first 30 min of the trip, Amin - our driver has already noted that I do take a lot of pictures! even at some point, he was worried that I will run out of camera battery before we reached the destination,  since I kept taking pictures of the road side and trees:).

Mount Nebo is 15-min (9km) drive from Madaba town towards Jordan Valley. The road there is uphill and in good condition. The weather was perfect (I guess I'm very impressed with this since I have mentioned this twice in this blog!). Red soil slopes full with olive trees and white rocks everywhere.

Soon we arrived in Mount Nebo, wandering around and taking more pictures of course! Good that we came early in the morning because 30-min after we arrived, there are a bunch of tourist group came. After the entrance, there is uphill lane to the top of mountain where the famous Serpentine Sculpture located. Too bad they're doing some renovation, therefore we can't enter and see the sculpture cosely. There is a point from where we can see the whole holy land. This is known as the point where Moses was shown the promised land to lead the nation to. It is also said that Moses died and was buried here, but until now there is no exact location where his tomb minght be. There is a monastery runs by Fransiscan. We saw one of the priest still wearing the traditional priest cloak and hat. They has a small museum which has the old mosaic and pictures. Near to the Sculpture, there is an olive tree planted by Pope John Paul II when he visited this site on 2002 for his pilgrimage.

I was working on an old steam ship, a tramp steamer, in 2008 and we made two trips to Aqaba in 2008. On the first trip we went from Lake Charles, LA with a partial load of grain to an Army ammunition base in North Carolina and loaded some military cargo to be delivered to the Egyptian Army in Alexandria, Egypt. We then sailed to Alexandria, Egypt,  unloaded the military cargo and left for the Port of Aqaba,Jordan by way of the Suez Canal and the Red Sea.  In Aqaba the grain was unloaded into trucks and it was shipped over to Western Iraq to feed the displaced people there.

On our second trip, we returned from loading the old ship again with grain in Lake Charles and stopped in Charleston, SC where we loaded some  military patrol boats for the Jordanian military.  We stopped in Aqaba for just one day and unloaded the military patrol boats then continued on to Kenya with the grain.

Aqaba is Jordans only seaport and is a very important port for the country. If you look at a  map you will see that Aqaba is located on the Red Sea on the Gulf of Aqaba. This Gulf extends northeast from the main part of the Red Sea south of Egypt's Sinai Peninsula to the eastward end ending at the cities of Aqaba, Jordan and Eilat, Israel. In addition to a very important seaport, Aqaba is also a very popular tourist destination. There are many very nice beaches there and the scuba diving is reputated to be some of the best in the world due to large coral reefs in the Gulf. We saw people from all over the Middle East, Europe, and Asia. We had just left Egypt and Aqaba seemed much more westernized than Egypt. Many people spoke English and there were many western style, fast food, restaurants. There were a lot of souvenir shops there.

One of the unusual things we saw there was a huge flag pole with the Jordanian Flag flying. According to Wikipedia, this flag pole is the tallest free standing flag pole in the world at 426 feet tall and weighing 172 tons. It is made of steel and has 11 sections. I have a picture of it from the Aqaba side in my blog photos but if you are interested, go to Wikipedia and see the beautiful panaramic photo of Aqaba with the flag pole in the center. This photo was taken from the Eilat, Israel side. Wikipedia also says the Jordian flag flying at the top is 98 feet tall and 197 feet long. Whee! I would hate to be the boy scout that had to fold that flag!

We stayed in Aqaba for 8 days the first trip and only overnight the second trip. We had plenty of time to go to town and eat and take in the sites. One tourist trip available that I unable to get off for was a day trip to the Dead Sea. I hope to go back someday and make that trip. As a crewman on one of these old ships, there are a lot of ports the ship goes to that you would not want to visit again but I can honestly say Aqaba is a place I would go back to given the chance. Aqaba is not an inexpensive place to go to though and I would make a through study with Google & TB before I went back on my own.

I was unaware of the significance of this place before my first visit there. Historically it is an ancient crossroads of trade. As our ship entered the Gulf of  Aqaba, Saudi Arabia was on our right and Egypt's Sinai peninsula was on our left and at the end of the Gulf were cities of both Jordan and Israel. But we felt very safe there and I would not hesitate to recommend it to another traveler. It was a very enjoyable trip!