Dubai Post 57: Getting to Be a Tourist Again (Part 1)

The trip to the Atlantis was an easy one to make by myself
since the cab ride was only 15AED. 

I was looking forward to being a host/tourist once Samantha got into town.  It has been a few weeks since I have done anything touristy in Dubai and it was over a month since my Dad left Dubai. If you were to ask anyone who has ever visited me in Chicago, they will tell you that I enjoy hosting and have actually created hour by hour itineraries for some of them. 

On Friday morning, I was waiting for Samantha to come and decided to start off my tourist weekend by heading to the water park at the Atlantis, Aquaventure. I had no one to go with but that was fine with me.  I had read a blog last week of a friend’s sister traveling the world alone and learned that sometimes, you just got to do things on your own. 

The waterpark was much more entertaining than Wild Wadi.  They had a slide that goes straight down that actually got my heart pumping.   They also have a slide where you ride through a glass tunnel that is engulfed in a gigantic shark tank, luckily it did not break. 

(I will let the pictures do some of the talking *some are professional ones*)

*Insert my face*  I do not believe the ending of the slide
is transparent in the tank.  I could not tell with all of the
water rushing up. 

The tube slide that goes through the shark tank.  

I have been on bigger slides before. 

It was about an hour or two into my Aquaventure experience when my hangover from Thursday night decided to rear its ugly head.  As I was riding down a tube slide, backwards, in the dark, I felt nauseous.  I then felt "the heaves" (an expression from my Wisconsin days) coming on so I decided to head to the Aquaventure beach to relax.  Afterwards, I checked out the aquarium at Atlantis, something that was actually worth the money you spent.  It was filled with tropical fish from the region exhibited in over the top Disney-like displays. 

There were a number of other slides.  In the top right you can see
the lazy river which was one of my favorite lazy rivers of all time.  This
was because it contained patches of rapids which I guess defeats the purpose
of being a lazy river. 

Some of the coolest jellies I have ever seen. 

These fish were massiveeee, the picture does not do them justice. 

Need some gold?  Needless to say, the cheapest item being
750AED, I did not take anything out of this ATM.
(Located on the way out of Atlantis)

Lesson Learned:  Do not go to a waterpark the day after going to Rock Bottoms.

After the waterpark, I then scurried to the airport to pick up Samantha.  Luckily she had no problems in customs and we hit the ground running for her vacation in Dubai.  Our first stop was one of my favorite bars, Barasti.  She got to see first-hand what the rowdy British crowd was like as their team took down Sweden.  After the game, it was around 1:30AM so I decided to give her a break and we headed home.  We had a jam-packed weekend ahead of us so stay tuned for those stories. 

The British fans came out in full force on Friday night.

The crowd went crazy when England went ahead.  It was a site to see
for any sports fan....Samantha did not care. 

First night in Dubai was a success!