As someone had said it beautifully, “It all starts with a dream”, yes, the trip that just came to its culmination after a span of 6 long and joyful days.
It all started with a causal discussion of number of events falling and lying during the same period. When all the bits fell into their places, I booked the tickets. I, Mayank Sehra (follow me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thespirited__traveller/?hl=en), set and covered the beautiful city of Dubai along with my family.
The first and the upfront thing is to book tickets on time. Since, we knew the tickets would going to cost us a little bit expensive due to New Year 2019, so we booked them around 35 days prior to our trip. I’ll be quoting every fare during my entire journal and will also be summarizing the entire expense at the end.
So, before you set to travel, get your hand on the following pointers:
VISA: Dubai is one of those countries that offers Indian Citizens a visa on arrival. Moreover, if you have someone already staying in Dubai, the e-visa can easily be arranged at a cost of Rs 6000/- per person easily.
FLIGHT: For flight booking, it’s better to avoid late and expensive rush by booking the tickets at an early phase once you are sure of your dates. It’s better and advisable to book 2 sided or return tickets, juts to ensure your expenses are a little budgeted. A two-sided ticket from New Delhi to Dubai would cost you somewhere around Rs 22347/-. (Note: My tickets were booked during the New Year time. So a little costly than off season).
FOREX CARD: A foreign exchange card aka FOREX Card is now a necessity for all those who are travelling abroad. You can easily avail the same from your respective Bank Branches. I availed the same from HDFC at a merely cost of Rs 500, since I already had an account in the bank. Moreover, some other external agencies like CENTRUM also provides you to avail a FOREX Card.
All Set To Go
DAY 1: NEW YEAR AT BURJ KHALIFA
To enjoy every comfort of a 3-hour long flight, I preferred to travel via Emirates. For a total of 3-person, one-way flight fare costed us around Rs 33,552. The Emirates, as well worldwide, is known for its comfort and luxurious travel. It takes care of your food, inflight entertainment and comfort. We boarded the flight from IGI Airport Terminal 3, New Delhi at 16:15 hrs and landed in Dubai International Airport at 18:35 hrs. You need not have to worry at the Airport or in Dubai City. Everything written there is in English and Arabic language. Just simply follow the sign boards once you are landed which would lead you to an in-bound Airport Metro which connects you from the Arrival side to your baggage claim area. Yes, you read it correct. Dubai has an in-bound Airport Metro running inside its Airport premises just to pick and drop passengers from one side of the Airport to other.
Once you’ve collected your baggage, you can easily shop from the Dubai Duty Free. We shopped a 12-pint Heineken Beer costing us just 74 AED, roughly Rs 1420. Not a bad deal, I guess. Dubai offers you a multiple mode of transportation and connectivity. From Airport, you can easily board a taxi (not cabs) or metro to reach your destination. Unlike India, taxis here are camera and SOS enabled. Moreover, the cab driver can’t say no to you once you sit inside the cab. The taxi fare from Airport starts from 11 AED while in city, the minimum taxi fare starts from 5 AED. So, we boarded a 7-Seater Innova from Airport which dropped us a Bur Dubai (The residential locality behind Burjuman Metro Station). My Sister along with her family stays there. Moreover, you can also rent a hotel room/apartment starting at a minimum 100 AEDs depending upon the locality and type.
So here we are, in DUBAI, around 2200 kms away from New Delhi. So, after 8 hours of travelling (1 hour from our Home to Delhi Airport, 3 hours inside the Delhi Airport, followed by 3 hours of flight and last 1 hour to our place), we finally reached at 8:30 PM and had a rest for around 1.5 hrs before to get set to explore the New Years’ Night in the highly enlightened Burj Khalifa.
Remember, if you are planning to spend new year’s ever while watching the beautiful countdown at Burj Khalifa, try and be there at least 3-4 hours prior that or you’ll end up in power-packed jammed roads. So, we decided not to be struck and instead, went on to see the Burj Khalifa from quite a distance near Valley 2 Café at Bur Dubai. One can easily enjoy the countdown show while watching the beautiful Burj Khalifa welcoming and embracing the new year in all dazzled-up lightning show.
What else do I need? I was out on New Year’s Eve with my entire family, welcoming New Year 2019 at a new place, Dubai with all the lightning and enlightened show. Moreover, it happened to by my niece’s very first new year.
DAY 2: BURJ KHALIFA, DUBAI MALL, WATER-FOUNTAIN SHOW
Day 1 was a long day for us. So, all we decided is to rest for the entire noon and be ready by 1600 hrs to explore the city in lights. We boarded a metro from Burjuman Station to Burj Khalifa-Dubai Mall Station. It’s a 5 stop destination from Burjuman Station. The metro station provides you a passage walk for at least 10-15 minutes that straightaway connects you inside the Dubai Mall, world’s largest mall, both in terms of area, footfall and the shopping/eating options that they provide to you. The mall itself is so beautiful and enormous that you’ll spend 3-4 hours just while walking, window shopping and exploring the beauty of the mall. The best part of the place is the water-light fountain show, which anyone can avail as it is free of cost but happens only on special occasions. This 4.5-minute show is a merely treat to the eyes of the viewers with the entire show being perfectly supported by Arabic music that gives viewers the feel of an Arabic atmosphere. One can also avail the exquisite panorama of the beautiful city by visiting the top of the world’s tallest building, Burj Khalifa.
Also, you can visit the in-mall Dubai Aquarium and Underwater Zoo that allows by paying 120 AED per person. Moreover, snorkelling can also be done out here.
After, spending almost 5-6 hours, we had dinner at Village Hub Restaurant, BurJuman, that serves exquisite varieties of Indian Meal under a budget of 30-50 AED per person.
DAY 3: DUBAI: BY FOOT, BY ROAD AND BY WATER
They say it perfectly, “the best way to explore a city, is by foot”. It allows a traveler to establish a connection with the beautiful panorama of the city. And when you are in Dubai, there’s no way you to say no. So, our 3rd day and we all were set out to explore the same.
We preferred to walk down the streets of Meena Bazaar. It’s hardly 10-15 mins away from Burjuman, with a walking distance. The Bazaar provides you an actual glimpse of Old Dubai. The area is being surrounded by a no of Asian men and women to such an extent, that is makes you rekindle your thoughts about your presence in an emirate. An area full of gold and glitters, people standing outside their shops in by lanes, offering you to have a visit in their shops. Those who want to buy some budgeted “Dubai” show-off stuff to their friends and family, this place is a perfect. There are several things to shop within a range starting from 1UED to 20 UED. To a few steps ahead you’ll find Ghubaiba Bus Station where you can easily find buses for Abu Dhabi, Oman, Global Village etc.
The moment you broaden your view from Ghubaiba, you’ll find a cool spring of water just nearby. To a few steps ahead, you’ll find an exquisite view of glittered up buildings ahead paving a way to what is known as DUBAI CREEK.
Dubai Creek, as is being fondly called, is a port where old Dubai meets New Dubai. A harbour, which was and is still being used for transporting various things both inter and intra emirate. All you need to do is just spend 1 UED per person out of your pocket to experience a ferry ride from Old Dubai to New Dubai. It’s a beautiful ride of around 5 minutes, giving a pleasant view of the perfectly built manmade city with a glittery reflection in the Dubai Creek Water. The Dubai Tourism allows tourists to experience a cruise dinner. Starting from a mere 15 AED per pax to 100 AED, a 2-hour dinner in a cruise is just all about the wow factor.
The moment you arrive at the port near the New Dubai arena, you’ll find a resemblance with European Cities. Long house buildings, glassy shades, QSR’s (Quick Service Restaurants) at the ground level, wide roads being accompanied by speedy vehicles and so on. Dubai seems to be all inspired from European Cities when it comes to art, architecture and Law.
We walked and walked and walked. We all were mesmerized by how beautiful and well-mannered a city could be, while at the same time being surrounded by a set of people hailing from countries widely apart from each other.
So after almost 3 hours of walking, we finally decided to treat ourselves dine at such place from where we could just see the world’s tallest building while enjoying our drinks. We hit straight to ESTRELLAS ROOFTOP LOUNGE at the Al Mina Road.
Being a Dilliwala, I found this place a perfect one for a jam-packed session. Exquisite roof top lounge, live dancing queens, music to set the mood right, amazing ambience, mouth watery dishes, draught beer, wine and BURJ KHALIFA, as the cheery on the top. One can even opt for a Hookah. This place serves free drinks to its female guests. We love the ambience so much that we managed to visit the place again, just 3 days after this hectic walking-walking day. And yes, this place did served as a “cherry on the top” sort of thing. A perfect place to end our day.
DAY 4: IT’S A BEACH DATE
Dubai, besides being surrounded by the tallest skyscrapers in the world, also summons a beautiful captcha of its own. The Beaches. Be it Palm Jumeriah Beach, Public, Marina, Kite, Open, Barasti, Azure, every beach has one common thing that spellbound the visitors, i.e., the tranquillity.
One of them is LA MER Beach.
It’s 2one of the newly developed beaches that managed to profound it’s existence in the recent years. Situated in a residential area, this beach has managed to attract kids a lot. One can easily spend 3-4 hours having a deep dive, sunbathing and simply observing the passage of time with respect to the on setting of the beautiful sun.
The best time to visit a beach is in the early morning to experience the morning breeze of the beautiful weather. So, we left for La Mer at around 10 in morning. From Burjuman Metro Station, it’s hardly a drive of almost 20 mins costing you around 40-45 UED. This place has a lot to offer right from water, rides, food, drinks and a perfect mesmerizing view for all the instagrammers.
We managed to get back to our place by 3PM. Had a quick nap and got ready to explore the Burjuman Mall. It’s a mall with exciting and cool hangout zones to let your taste buds experience the joy of pocket friendly food. An atrium leading you to all the big brands of retail world. One could easily get enough time of 3-4 hours just shopping and exploring the small as well as big budgeted shops. This mall also has a unique play arena for all the toddlers and the youngsters allowing them to have a full hand held experience on the jocular buds.
DAY 5: THE GLOBAL VILLAGE
If you ask any visitor or any traveller about their bucket list of the places to visit and thing to do in Dubai, you’ll find The Global Village almost on the top of it.
This place has everything to offer and everyone to offer. Right from the toddlers to all the elderly aged people, this place is a complete whole sum package of all the thing and activities that won’t even let anybody get out of there.
“Lights, Camera, Action” is an appropriate one liner for this place.
A very beautifully conceptualized man-made village, this place has all the best offering from almost all the countries of this world. Be it apparel, food, home made remedies, art & articraft, food, travel, living, music, lifestyle and what not. UAE, USA, European Countries, Asian countries, have all their people representing their countries and giving a larger than live theme-based experience that would feel as if you are almost present and experiencing the beautiful country.
Other than country-based themes, this place has a lot to offer when it comes to food. One can easily spot a food joint/outlet/van present in every 2-3-minute walk. In addition to this, you can even enjoy light games, activities, rides at a nominal costing starting from 5 UED onwards and even have a lot to offer the winners with freebies in form of soft toys. And when it comes to entertainment, a lot of live performances can be observed in all the country areas as well as the centre of the park which almost has performers from round the globe, performing live in front of you.
From Burjuman it’s a ride of nearly 45-50 mins costing around 150 UEDs. For entry in the Village, it will cost around 15 UED per pax.
Just plan this visit to Global Village in advance and keep a spare time of 6-8 hours to enjoy a beautiful outing with your friends, family and loved ones.
DAY 6: DINNER AT CRUISE
Sailing towards the dawn of a beautiful family trip, treating us with a prime dinner time, we planned a cruise dinner in advance to avoid any last-minute cancellation.
And when it comes to Cruise Dinner, the only name that comes to one’s mind is Dubai Marina. A big white colour yacht, especially decorated in white light, a soothing music, live performances, sailing in the beautiful marina being surrounded by the lighting of all the skyscrapers gives a perfect place to enjoy a perfect evening dinner time with family. It’s a 2 hrs cruise dinner offering an exquisite range of mouth-watering Mughlai, Arabic and Indian food offering in a buffet based system. Costing at a starting range of 50 UED’s per pax to even 200 UED’s, it depends upon the package which one Wanted to choose and enjoy with family.
I would suggest to at least go for a cruise dinner at least once with your loved ones. The best way to create a memorable lifetime experience.
DAY 7: ADIEU TO THE CITY OF EMIRATES
In a way to bid adieu to the beautiful city of Emirates, we prefer a long and comfortable flight with Emirates from Dubai Terminal 3. A beautifully crafted and designed Airport is one of the simplest and easy to go Airport, with nothing and no where to hassle at all. Unlike Indian Airports with so much of intense frisking and security scanning, this Airport will hardly take a maximum of 25 mins to get through all the frisking and security checks to get through and experience the retail and food outlet arena of the Airport.
With a cup of refreshing cup of COSTA coffee, we ended this trip on a very happy and high on life note.
Overall Expense: For a Family of 4, a budgeted trip to Dubai for 6-7 days would eaily cost you a total of Rs 1.50 Lakh in all.
Other Places To Explore In Dubai:
1. Desert Safari: One of the musts with family and friends. Need to make an advance booking online/tourist agency. Expect a complete day of sand, desert safari, car ride and Arabic food and dance.
Note: Not advised to pregnant ladies, toddlers less than 5 years and elderly people with health issues like heart and BP.
2. Sight seeing Dubai HOHO bus tours.
3. Dubai Atlantis Adventure
4. Miracle Garden
5. Dubai Frame
6. Ski Dubai
7. Souk Madinat
8. Day Trip To Abu Dhabi
Stay Tuned for the next Travel Blog
"Rab Rakha"
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