It has been ages since last post

It has been months since our last post and so much has changed, yet much is still the same.

In the early fall we went back to the USA for a 3 week cross country vacation to see friends and family, Art stayed for 3 months to do Inn work in the busy Fall Foilage season in New Hampshire. Here is a pic of the maple in our front yard:

In November Marta had minor surgery; Art came back to the UAE to care for her during her recovery. She is fine now and feeling better then she has for the past 2 years.

We joined the Gym at the Hotel Resort that is part of the complex where we live. It is a Rotana Hotel that has a nice pool, great huge clean gym with all new Natulis machines; the treadmills look out over the pool and ocean:

Marta is working pretty hard; Art lies around this pool most afternoons. I do Inn work on the computer, mostly advertising, marketing and paying bills and doing the books. It is a tough life. I recently started an Inn email marketing campaign. I sent out our Valentine Package Information about the specials I am running at the Inn. Sadly the 4th or 5th Inn in our valley has closed due to financial problems in the past 18 months or so. the recession hit the valley pretty hard in 2009 and 2010. Last year did pick up for us and we are hoping to improve on that trend this year.

We have taken 3 trips to Dubai in the past 2 months; extending our exploring outside of Abu Dhabi. I think we have see most of Abu Dhabi, it is after all a small island and besides, Mosques, Malls, Sand and Ocean and about 1.5 million immigrants, there is not much else to see or do. I do plan a Kayaking trip with an Eco-Resort outfit that explores the Mangroves and hopefully a camping trip soon before winter ends.

Dubai Creek and Diera region are pretty nice, we take the 30 cent water taxi accross the creek

This is Marta and Linda at the Dubai Creek a water taxi is behind them. Marta recruited Linda from St Agnes Hospital...who else can she steal, she needs all the help she can get right now.


Dubai is Huge, The Diera region is filled with small shops and alleys that sell gold, jewelry, watches, handbags, perfumes, seeds and herbs and all kinds of clothes. We have been there each tiem we go to Dubai and wander the small alleys, nooks and crannies. There are thousands of people from India and the sub continent there and it is always interesting to just people watch.
The first pic below is of a "Waterbus" kinda crazy school bus/boat combo that cruises the creek.

During the GCC Gulf Council Countries where the 6 heads of state of the Arabian countries (UAE, Oman,Kuwait,Bahrain,Qatar,Saudia Arabia) meet to discuss their regions problems, etc. they Met accross the street at the Emerates Palace Hotel, Security was tight, sniffer dogs, mirrors under cars. etc. To get to our Flat we had to pass a roadblock for 3 days and we were issued security ID cards to allow us to pass. We had to turn in our Passports to Security about 1 week ahead of time so they could do a background check on all the tenants in our building. The hotel connected to us (the Rotana Rayhan) was the place all all the aides were put up, we were discouraged from 'walking around' the premises..


Out fron they had Naval Warships guarding the Palace Hotel, below is a picture of one of about a dozen patrol boats pacing back and forth around the palace on the Ocean side. On the grounds of the Hotel they had 2 roving Jeeps with Mounted Machine guns...They take security very seriously here.

And to our left in the empty lot next to the ocean, they set up a field hospital I am assuming it was in case of some kind of succesful terrorist attack on the Conference. This was taken from our Kitchen balconey window

Back to fun stuff, below is another Dhow, a larger one like the one I wanted to buy for about $10K back in Abu Dhabi. I was thinking I could do harbor cruises and evening dining and dancing along the lights of the city. I was voted down by the boss

One interesting side note is on our last trip to Dubai we were so hungry in the afternoon that the restaurant we went to was called TGIT, Thank God it's Thursday). It looked like a regular TGIF back in the states, but it turned out to be Prostitute hangout. We sat down and noticed right away all the girls in the aisles were NOT waitresses, but young Russian and Asian hookers strutting their stuff. We did actually eat lunch, as it was entertaining to watch. Even Marta and Linda got a kick out of it. I googled it back home and found out it is in the top 1o places to pick up a hooker in Dubai. OMG....

Below is a pic of the Wooden Dhow races held Christmas week, we got there at the finish line to cheer them back . The race was out at sea and the finish was at the mouth of the harbor. The top 10 finishers were allowed inside the breakwater to take a victory lap, the others had to go to some other beach to dock. These are amazingly beautiful simple ships.

Later that night we went to the Dubai Global Village. An Epcott Center place, huge like Disneyland, but all African, Middle East and Asian countries are represented. It was fun and we spent about 5 hours there wandering around each countries shops and food stalls, We bargained with a carpet sales man for 1/2 hour and just walked away as he was asking way too much for his Afghan carpets...2 to 3 times the amount we pay back in Abu Dhabi at our local dealers place. Oh by the way we have bought 3 more carpets in the past month. here is a shot of the 2 Tribal Afghan runners I bought. There are 2 other runners I plan on buying once I get a job. These ones from Afghanistan are pretty reasonable, less then 200 US dollars each, all hand woven wool

Well that is it for awhile, Today we went to the "Rainbow Sheikhs" car museum out in the desert, but we got there in the middle of Friday Prayers, I took a few pictures outside of some cars..and the LARGEST motor home ever. I need to download those from my camera which is in the car. I will post those, but we have to go back to go inside. evidently he has hundreds of classic and rare cars tucked away in his private museum which is open to the public, just not during Prayer time and we did not want to hang around for 2 hours as there was NOTHING else out there but sand and sun and we were hungry. All for NOW....Art and Marta