Emirates Palace - Abu Dhabi

The Emirates Palace in Abu Dhabi. Quite a symbol of Arab Opulence. Built at a cost of $ 3 Billion, the Palace occupies 850,000m² of floor space. Underground parking allows housing for 2,500 vehicles. Built as a Palace but now converted to a super luxury hotel. Wonder if I can ever make it to stay there...



This picture below is of the lobby area and if you look at it twice you will find it a bit surreal! You can see the elaborate ceiling and the reception counter on the same plane! Well actually, I did some 'photostitching', i.e., put together about 5 pictures to create it! I so wanted to capture the whole ambience out there!
Most digital cameras come with some or the other 'photostitching' software these days. Of course, you can use one of those wide angle or 'fish eye' lenses. But again they have their limitations too.

Lure of the Azure

The love of the seas is enduring in Kuwait. Pearl diving and sea trade with the ‘dhows’, as the traditional wooden ships are called here, were central to the Kuwaiti way of life. Those were the difficult yet adventurous ways of life here before oil. But the lure of marine life survives in the contemporary ways among the young Kuwaitis though not particularly for any commercial purposes.

Dashing young dudes with the coolest hairstyles and worked out bodies whizzing about in the seas on jet skis or sailing into the horizon on the snazzy modern yachts with all the paraphernalia like GPS navigation systems, entertainment gizmos, angling gear and other cool stuff I may not even have an inkling of!

And contrary to popular beliefs, you can even find girls speeding away on these mean jet skis.

The slightly older generations are ardent fishing aficionados and good at that too. Like, I saw this gentleman on the marina at the Khiran Resort waiting patiently with a bare fishing line (without a rod) and pulling out that wriggling silver prize, and the pride showed!

Dubai

Burj Al-Arab, Dubai – probably one of the most photographed manmade structures of the modern world and a symbol of Arab opulence. Could not help but put my budding photographic skills to test. The night time low light conditions seem to have caught on my fancy. Maybe the greater challenges involved makes it more exciting.

The desert safari, a modern day concept of negotiating desert lands on 4X4 automobiles. Also called ‘Dune Bashing’, this exhilarating adventure of riding up and down sand dunes brings in unusual moments of thrill amongst the otherwise barren desert lands. It was difficult to photograph considering the fact that I was getting thrown all around inside the 4X4 all the while! Truly, it’s been quite a journey for mankind from the desert safaris of crossing hundreds of miles of deserts merely on camels to these modern day beasts of burden – the 4X4’s!

At one of the stops there was this interesting little desert lizard posing so smartly for all of us to take its pictures!