February 22, 2015 – Muscat, Oman to New Dubai, U.A.E.

2015 Gems of Arabia

I get up at 6AM this morning, since our bag pickup is 6:30AM and we leave on the bus at 7:30AM. We have five hours of driving time to Dubai, and the time we spend at the border will add to that elapsed time.

Unlike UAE citizens, Omanis work in service jobs. Our guide Yacoob shares with us that he worked as an airport bus driver, then a switchboard operator before learning enough English to become a guide. He has six children and is also a grandfather at 42 years of age. He lives in Muscat.

Today is the first day it is cloudy and it might rain. We have had very good weather so far, with every day being clear. We are not stopping for lunch today, so I saved a few snacks from the hotel buffets last night and this morning to eat along the way. We drive along route 1 from Muscat, through Sohar, Bani’ Umar, then inland to the border, continuing to Dubai. We get some rain along the coastal route. Although we are on an expressway, there are some roundabouts along the way. We stop at 10:30AM for a rest break in Sohar.

Our bus takes Route 5 in Oman and E44 in UAE (green arrows) which looks more direct to Dubai than the route chosen by Google Maps (blue), but it means crossing the border between the two countries three times! Obviously, crossing a border once takes a lot less time, even if the distance travelled is a bit longer. This concept escaped our travel company’s planning process…however we arrived in Dubai unscathed, albeit a bit later than planned.

We are staying in the new section of Dubai at the Manzil Hotel, which is across the street from the massive Dubai Mall, and within walking distance to the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world.