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More Notes From Doha: Oil, Riches And Fun On The Desert Sands
“I will say, you two don’t look English, you look German”. Well, Mohammed, I’m not sure whether we should be complimented by that or not, so we’ll give a little laugh and move on. Mohammed laughs too, points the Landcruiser out of the city and drives out towards the desert. Every highway is pristine, flyovers wind around each other like giant bowls of spaghetti, the carriageway is wide and lined for miles and miles with colourful flowering shrubs. Qatar simply shouts of riches, of money, of investment. Our route to the desert passes evidence not just of how the riches are spent, but also from where those riches emanate. Giant…
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A Medina For The 21st Century: Notes From Doha
A whole host of playful and inventive architectural minds must have been let loose in Doha and granted the freedom to create the spectacle which the city now is: an astonishing environment where its ultra modern districts sparkle with breathtaking space age buildings which thrill, deceive and impress all in one go. It’s a futuristic skyline which must surely be up there with the most stunning in the world – and there’s more than one such skyline in this city. Astonishing, gigantic, amusing, inspired: everything is here. The area known as West Bay boasts skyscrapers in cylinders, pyramids and twisted shapes of irregular lines. Asymmetric floor levels taunt the eye…
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More Notes From Doha: Oil, Riches And Fun On The Desert Sands
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It’s That Time Again…
We love this bit. Printed maps spread across the table, guide books poised and travel blogs open on the right page. The calendar sheets printed off from the iPad take centre stage, constantly being altered, updated, erased and re-pencilled, as we discover new destinations, unearth different transport opportunities and change the planned route one more time. Travel is such a joy that even the planning stage is always a significant source of excitement. Sparks fly every time Michaela moves. There’s only a few days to go now. Next week we head off to Heathrow, flying first to the Qatari capital of Doha for that stopover where we will discover whether…
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Michaela’s Favourite Photographs: #6 On Top Of The World
Wadi Musa, Jordan 2019. This is the first travel photograph of this collection which wasn’t taken by Michaela. Our host Ahmed took it as he lead us on a thrilling trek through the rocky desert location around Wadi Musa, making our way eventually to the magnificent and world renowned sight of Petra. As we sat gazing at our wonderful surroundings, Ahmed took up Michaela’s camera and captured our moment.
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When I’m 64…..
Will you still need me, will you still feed me…so went the Beatles lyric. Well, I’m about to find out whether Michaela will still need and feed, birthday greetings, bottle of wine, and all of those things, because I am actually 64 today, and “celebrating” (if that’s the right word) a second successive lockdown birthday. I don’t think we really thought, on my 63rd, that we would be back in the same situation a year later. There have been some rather more exotic locations for our previous birthdays, most notably the year before COVID, on the occasion of my 62nd, when we were staying with a Bedouin family in their…
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Amman: Last Day In Jordan
Last day in Amman after an amazing trip to Jordan
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Amman, City of Hills and City of Change
A full days tour of Amman City
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From the mountains to the desert: 3 days in Wadi Rum
3 Days living the life of a Bedouin in Wadi Rum
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Petra, and a birthday like no other
Walking through the lost City of Petra and experiencing the renowned hospitality of the Bedouins
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From Amman to Wadi Musa: seeking the real Jordan.
So the plan starts well, a fairly leisurely breakfast and a quick shuttle back to the airport terminal to collect the hire car, obviously nothing can go wrong. Except that a slightly surreal misunderstanding means that our bodies and our car are some 90 minutes apart, with our car, bizarrely, waiting for us at a military airport instead of the main one. We only know this because a guy from the same hire company spots the paperwork in our hands, and asks who we are! But the guy, and his company, Omaish Rental, are just so helpful and so eager to please that they find a replacement car and get…
