Celebrating My 40th In Dubai Trip Report - Day 1

[Siddex]

Sunday 24th April (Day 1):
We landed on time at 6.15AM at Dubai airport and made our way through the extremely efficient, clean airport without any incident. Passport control was a breeze, it only took about 5 minutes to get through there – none of the usual USA immigration scrum. After we cleared security, we went to the duty free shop for a look around and purchased some beer and vodka for consumption in our room. This was another TA tip as alcohol can be very expensive in Dubai.

I also picked up a local SIM card for cheaper calls and changed some money over (again I was advised I would get a much better exchange rate locally and that information was also accurate).

Once all that was done, we made our way out of the airport to get our courtesy car to the hotel. This is where the confusion started!

I had been in email contact with the hotel before our arrival to advise them of our flight numbers and a few other things. It appeared our arrival time had not been documented and I had not been sent instructions on the procedure for arranging our pick up. We left the terminal building and scanned the waiting line of people expecting to see our names, but nothing. So we waited and then waited some more, but nothing!

I went back into the terminal to search for a booth for our hotel because as you are leaving the airport most of the chain hotels / car hire companies, etc have an information booth. But I could not find anything to do with our hotel.

After about 20 minutes of waiting and fruitless scanning information booths I decided to try and get in contact with the hotel. My DU (the UAE network) SIM card was not yet activated so I had to resort to using my UK one to ring the hotel in Dubai. Eventually I managed to get through, after dropping and adding numbers to the country and area codes, I explained the situation to them and they promised to sort it. My phone rang shortly after and it was a gentleman from the airport information desk (yes they did have one!) looking for me! We managed to locate each other and he took us back inside the terminal to wait for the car – as it would be about 20 minutes. He took us back to a desk that I had passed a few times and when I looked closely I could see that the Grosvenor was listed and the desk was shared with another hotel group!

He found us a seat and furnished us with some water (this is a bit of a theme in Dubai) and we waited for our car. True to his word in a little under 20 minutes we were being ushered back outside to our waiting car.

Just a word on the outside temperature here, when we initially went outside it was already 28C and this was only 7.00AM!

Once our luggage was loaded the driver gave us more ice cold water and some cold towels to freshen ourselves up and we were on our way to the Grosvenor House Hotel.

On the walk to our car, we had our first look at the clash of the cultures between east and west. There were a small group of Arabs working near the car and when they spotted Maria they all stopped and just stared at her! And I don’t mean looked and then carried on, I mean full blown tools down and stare intently! I guess they are not that used to busty Western women! I found it quite amusing but Maria was a bit unnerved!

It took us what seemed ages to get there (about 30 – 40 minutes in the end) as the traffic was getting quite heavy and it is a fair way from the airport. The initial impressions of Dubai were how vast it all was. I mean, Florida is vast but there are generally things to look at as you go along, usually shops and restaurants. In Dubai there are lines and lines of nameless, faceless buildings. It is a very business area and so there are a great many offices and apartments. I managed to pick out a few sites along the way but most of the time there was nothing of interest!

Once we arrived we were greeted and shown into the hotel. Someone greeted us and took us straight up to our room as the check in process would be conducted there! This is one of the features of this hotel that I had read on Trip Advisor.

Check in was a breeze, well it would be sat down in your own hotel room! We were shown how everything worked and where everything was. I had made a few requests and they were all taken care of. I had emailed the hotel letting them know I was celebrating my 40th in Dubai and had asked for a room with a view. I had also asked for breakfast on the first day instead of the last as we would be leaving the hotel in the early hours on departure day. All my requests were granted and our first impressions of the Grosvenor were very favourable.

The room was great and everything was remote controlled, which excited me greatly! The wrap around balcony afforded some great views of the beach and the Dubai Marina. The bathroom was very nice and the bed was probably one of the most comfortable I have ever slept in!


View from our room.


In the distance we could see the Burj Al Arab.


And the other way we could see the beach.


I spent hours playing with these touch controls!

We quickly freshened up and then went to get our breakfast from Sloane’s (the breakfast buffet restaurant). This was amazing! The variety, choice and quality of the food was brilliant and I managed to stuff myself silly!

After breakfast, we had a couple of hours rest in the room to recover the lost night’s sleep and to try and adjust our body clocks.

The plan was then, to have an afternoon by the pool before going out for dinner later. So swimming stuff was unpacked and we made our way down to the pool area!

BAM! That was the effect of the heat as we opened the door from the nice air conditioned hotel to the outside world of the pool area. It was like opening an oven door in your face! A wall of heat! I had never experienced anything like that before. Florida is hot and sticky, this was just hot and hot!

The pool man, found us a couple of spare sun beds by the pool and he set them up for us (another example of the brilliant service you find everywhere in Dubai). He also brought us over some ice water and fruit.

We whiled away a few hours at the pool, the sun did disappear from the pool area at about 2PM (a well reported TA fact), the pool man did offer to relocate our sunbeds to an area around the corner where the sun was still present, but to be honest a respite from the sun was very welcome and it was still very warm in the shade.

After a very relaxing afternoon we went back to the room, freshened up and changed into suitable attire for the Club Lounge and went up to said Club Lounge to check it out. Once we had managed to locate it! We went in and had a couple of complimentary drinks and some snacks (one of which was an extremely dodgy looking Octopus thing!). Once again the level of service in the Grosvenor Club Lounge was impeccable and we were kept topped up in drinks and very well looked after.


Sampling some unknown food things.

Once proper hunger had set in, we set off for ‘The Butcher Shop’ near the ‘The Walk – Jumeirah Beach Residence’ (this is an area that has quite a few shops and restaurants) via a very reasonably priced taxi ride.

I do not have any record of what we ate here, but I remember it was very good. This restaurant does not have an alcohol license and that fact and the Entertainer voucher I used here, made this meal very reasonable!

After dinner we had a bit of a walk around the JBR, before getting another taxi to take us back to the Grosvenor.

Once back at the Grosvenor I spoke to a Concierge about booking a restaurant for my birthday meal and also afternoon tea at the Burj Al Arab. He took our details and said to leave it with him.

That then did us for the day and we retired to our room for a blissful sleep on the wonderfully comfortable bed.

[tracy99]

found it
another great read,i look forward to hearing more.
tracy x

[Glee Fan]

Poor Maria getting ogled at!

Sounds like a great day by the pool though and an enjoyable dinner.

[anniee]

Love the view from your hotel window. Great 1st day.

[3Lions]

Pleased you enjoyed the start of your holiday. As a resident of Dubai, what you describe for traffic is a pretty much every day occurrence. There can be a few mix-ups with transport, as you encountered. The Grosvenor is a great hotel, as many are. You are in the thick of the action down in the Marina as far as bars & clubs are concerned. The Walk is fantastic away from the Summer season, when it's just too hot to stroll outside. You got an Entertainer. Well done that man! I would think you are only one of a handful of non-residents who know about it and the benefits of having it (I'm sure someone will tell me if I'm wrong). It does make some quite expensive meals half the price. By the way, those guys you saw outside the airport working were very unlikely to be Arabs (which covers a number of nationalities). They were most likely Indian or Sri Lankan.

[RT7]

Great first day.
Fabulous view from your room.

[DIBBadmin]

This thread has been automatically closed as it has not been posted on in 365 days.