Qasr Al Sarab - The Trilogy III

Final day in the desert and we had to tick the "camel riding" box 

Sam went for the "Out of Africa" look that would have made Karen Blixen proud, and of course she was fitting right in with the locals

well some of the locals ..our personal camel herder with his very pretty and colorful camel outfits

it's just like riding the Rodeo

as elegant as ever - "white knuckle" camel riding 

we tried to play it cool ....but thank God the ride was over 

maybe I should start training now for that 155 mile run across the Sahara..not sure what the fuss is all about?

Qasr Al Sarab - The Trilogy II

thankfully the "dungeons and dragons" board game vision was quickly replaced by quiet bliss by our private pool which came in handy as the temperature reached 48 degrees

After having shed the guilt of being in a pool in the middle of the desert (thankfully Sam knows all the building codes and know they have very strict recycling requirements...phew) we started enjoying the views

and funnily enough whether we looked north, east, south or west  all we saw was sand, sand...and more sand

it could be mistaken from a photo from the middle of Australia

all we needed now was a roof top party 

however not a party in sight so we read

and we read some more

and we watched sunsets

thank God for cocktail hour we hit the french restaurant for the hazy sunset and cranberry vanilla cosmos (yes we still drink those 1993 concoctions) 

its still a little "dungeon and dragon"-like from afar

and what else were we going to do after a night of drinking in the middle of the desert...runway modeling of course!!

after that performance let's just say it's a good thing I have a real daytime job...to be continued...

Qasr al Sarab - the trilogy I

Sam had organized a birthday weekend treat for us at Qasr Al Sarab - A resort by Anantara in the "Empty Quarter Desert" - one of the most arid places on earth. The road there was very loooong, straight and uneventful

Thankfully we were able to rely on Sam's pea sized bladder and no road side toilets for a bit of entertainment ...

unfortunately the pictures of the acrobatics she went through for "relief" have been censored but Sam was grateful for the dunes and hiding behind "foxy" (yes we named our car!!)

no matter how many stories I told it was hard to distract Sam from an endless journey without any other shops than the very scary "white Sand restaurant"

and there were lots of sand - most of it red (not sure why they called that restaurant "white sand" and we didn't dare to find out)

at the gate to the resort with just another 8 kilometers of "dune bashing" to go..thank god for a great navigation system

We finally arrived at what we had feared would be similar to a large "dungeons and dragons" board game.....to be continued...