December 2nd is National Day in the UAE and this year marked the 41st year that the seven emirates unified to form a country. There was a parade downtown complete with camels, floats, musicians and other patriotic pageantry. Doesn’t that sound like fun? Well, it doesn’t to my husband. While I read the description, all he heard was “traffic, no parking, crowds of people, tired, grumpy children….” So we didn’t go. Instead, we decided to drive to the town of Hatta. It’s only an hour from Dubai and you have to cross a bit of Oman, and then re-enter the UAE, to get there. It was such a pleasant, stress-free, simple yet satisfying afternoon. Usually, when we take these little excursions, we get lost take scenic detours or something is closed that was supposed to be open. We were lucky this time around though and all went as planned. Despite being only an hour away, its landscape is completely different from Dubai; it looks very much like Oman which makes sense given its proximity. Here are a few photos.
Map via Lonely Planet. You can see how close Hatta is to Oman here.
Taken from the car on the way to Hatta. The vibrant blue sky was so pretty that day. There were even puffy white clouds which we normally don’t see much of.
Lots of bearded old guys walked past where we parked. Wonder where they were headed? Maybe the mosque?
UAE National Day pride
This and the next few are from Heritage Village – an example of village life from 400 years ago. Featured old houses built from stones and palm trees. The rooms gave information about how people used to live here.
Don’t worry, these guys were really nice. Ha ha – just kidding, they are fake, but they scared us for a second.
This place was heaven for the boys. Mysterious, heavy doorways with who-knows-what behind them, watchtowers and plenty of rocks – a recipe for fun!
This and the next few are of the dam in Hatta
Dubai skyline welcoming us back home
Lovely photos! Nice to get away from the glitz and glamour of Dubai for a while. Hard to imagine Dubai probably looked like this not so very long ago.
Thank you Judy! Yes, that’s exactly how we felt – very nice to have a bit of a break from Dubai and we lucked out with such a beautiful day!
Lynda
Always look forward to your posts. Save travels to Houston xx
Thank you so much Jo! Thanks for commenting.
I wish you guys were going to be in Houston too. I still haven’t accepted that you moved – it’s feels temporary ….
Great pics. I cannot believe how big the boys have gotten!
Hatta looks like quite a special place. Great pictures!
Thank you! Happy New year!
Thanks for the visual tour, your photos are really great. Like you, I’m an expat from Houston living in Egypt so it was great finding your blog!
Thanks! Great to hear from another Texan in the region! Looking forward to checking out your blog.