Finally, the beach!

I've been here nearly two months to the day, and today was my first day at the beach! Reasons for not going down there yet are varied: a) i finish work so late that by the time I get home it's dark, and the beach isn't lit well. b) it's sooooo hot now that unless you ge up at 6 am to go down there, you'll fry. c) anyone who knows me will tell you that getting up at 6 am, at the weekend, is way beyond me.


However, today, despite having worked well over 80 hours this week, I dragged myself out of bed at 6, and was at the beach by 615. And it is GORGEOUS down there. There's a variety of places that you can park up, a park, which wasn't open, or just the plain old beach. I'd heard that the beach is mobbed first thing in the morning as everyone wants to avoid the heat, but we counted about 10 other peole down there.


It reminds me a lot of Miami - beautiful wide beach, with a hulking great city behind it. The water is the clearest brightest blue, and not as warm as people tell you. We sat on towels and watched an enormous dredger pumping sand in the distance, probably to build another of 'the world's largest something or other'. The Burj was next to us and you can see Atlantis in the far distance. Bizarrely, it was very relaxing.

As an island girl the beach is my favourite place in the world, and for the first time since I arrived two months ago I fell back in love with Dubai. I really must make an effort to get up earlier in future.....