Not a thing. It was awesome.
Okay, I got my ass kicked. Er, beat. Well, it's red at the very least. I'll get to that in a minute.
My 12pm activity has been postphoned until tomorrow morning, so I figured since I have the entire day free, I'd do nothing. First day of vacation should be full of R&R. And it was exactly that. I grabbed the camera and walked down to the beach... waded right into the Gulf. It was warmer than bath water (but not uncomfortably hot) and clearer than any seawater I've ever seen. Took a few pix of the Burj and my hotel (Jumeirah Beach Hotel, aka "JBH") from the beach and from in the water, meanwhile holding the camera over my head as the waves came in.
After dropping the camera off at the room, I headed to one of the pools. Guess which one? Yeah, the non-family one. Pulled up a cozy chair, a couple beach towels, and hopped into the water. Drifted up to the swim-up bar for a lemonade, and sat my derierre down on the steps in the water. A little tanning oil and I was in a good place. Get this - every couple hours a guy with a over-shoulder cooler comes around and hands out these wonderful white tropical fruit-flavored popsicles. Free. I love this place.
After browsing a brochure about desert safaris, I thought I'd explore the grounds a bit more. A few twists and turns later, and still in my bathing suit under my dress, I found the Wild Wadi Water Park, which is also attached to the JBH grounds. If you're a guest here, you have unlimited free (!) access. After tossing my bag (JBH also gives all guests free tote/beach bags), I was going to start off taking it easy on the Lazy River. Two times around the park on that, and I was ready for a little more adventure.
This is where the red rear end comes in. Tip: next time you're at a water park, wear a one-piece bathing suit. Here's why... in order to get from the lazy river at ground level to the top of the water slides in which gravity takes you DOWN, the upward slides have water jets shooting up/forward to push you along. Yeah, they push you, but if you're facing forward and your tube is like a donut and not a disk, then they also push your bottoms down. I tried to position myself to go up backward, then they'd just spray in my face and give me a wedgie from Hades. I couldn't win. One slide leads to another slide to another slide to an intersection with your chioce of four more slides, so there were a LOT of those upward jets ruthlessly pummeling my butt. After a while, OUCH, my a$$ felt like I just left detention at catholic school. By the way, ever ride down a water slide twisting and turning... in the DARK?? Yeah, a good 1000 feet like that in pitch black, twisting, turning, all over the place. Blackness. I might go back again tomorrow. :) Also, let's not underestimate the value of a base tan. Spent 6 hours in the sun today with nothing but tanning oil, and not a trace of sunburn. Base, base, base. Start in March if you have to.
After all that, I grabbed a snack and headed back to the leisure pool. And the popsicle guy came around again. I love this place. Did I mention that? While lying at the pool with the Burj Al Arab looming above me, every so often I saw a helicopter land at the top of it to drop off/pick up a new guest. They certainly spare no expense here. All I could muster was, "you've got to be kidding me. That's... ridiculous." In a "yeah, I'm jealous, and this place puts Vegas to shame" sort of way.
I can't imagine coming to Dubai and staying anywhere else. If you can lay down the cash, JBH is the place to be. So much to do. Then again, it's Ramadan and I got a steal of a rate that should almost be illegal, so maybe that's an exception to the rule. There's a reason it's on CNT's Gold List. You get what you pay for.
It's about 90 minutes to sunset and iftar, so I'm going to shower, call local friends, take the camera down to the beach again to get a sunset shot of the Burj (sun sets behind it), and settle down for the night's festivities. I realize I haven't left the hotel yet today, but I'm okay with that. Tomorrow will be an exploration outside the grounds... I'll be heading to the Crown Plaza Tower, and the Emirates Towers are just across the way. You'll probably know them if you see them.
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