"You must go camping in the desert, it's a much more authentic experience than being in the city", everyone says when you move to Dubai.Oooh that sounds great we thought and headed off to Lulu Hypermarket and splashed out on a 'delux' cheapo 2 man tent made of tin foil and string and various other bits of faff you need to go camping.
This activity caused a row, about which approach we would take to our Dubai camping trip.
You see Johan is a Viking adventurer, raised in the Värmland wildes of West central Sweden. Whereas, I was raised in the industrial West Midlands in the UK, not far from spaghetti junction.
I once took Johan camping to Sommerset in the UK and he was horrified the camp site had electricity, warm running water and a social club.
Camping Scandi style is literally out in the wilderness, chopping down trees for fire wood, bathing in the lake, subsisting on self sourced Smultron (wild strawberries) and generally avoiding Elk and Bears!
I am British and our idea of camping is a daddy long legs infested shower block, a fry up in the morning and having a pub within walking distance.
Plus, I'm also a Glamper!
Glamping is glamorous camping - it's a movement in itself, but for me it's also a state of mind, a philosophy if you like, whereby there is no excuse not to be glamorous EVA, regardless of the circumstances.
This caused us to clash, as Johan wanted to purchase the bear minimum of camping and desert survival essentials. Whereas, I wanted to purchase pretty Marrocan lanterns and foil plated hard plastic wine glasses.
I've mentioned before my deep hatred of drinking wine in disposable plastic cups.
We finally compromised and I forewent the lanterns but held out for a scented candle, the shinny wine glasses and some decorative beakers from Zara Home (they were in the sale!)
Our next row was about the food we would take in our newly purchased cheapo cool box. Johan wanted to take m.e.a.t, yup just meat. I gave in to that demand but also insisted on a selection of cold mezze, side salads and deserts to accompany our m.e.a.t.
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| Essential Glamping preperations! |
Next I made us late because of course I had to paint my nails.
I was shouted at for this, words to the affect of "What's the effing point of painting your effing nails to go camping!" were uttered.
Eventually, with all our gear tightly packed we headed off in our newly acquired and much coveted Mitsubishi Pajero.
This replaced our previous rental car a basic model Toyota Yaris that we had non-loving named
'The babies shoe' as it was of a similar size to one.
It was the lowest spec in existence, if the wind blew we'd sway into the next lane of traffic and it didn't even have the essential passenger side make up mirror...so it had to go darlings!
The first rule of driving into the desert is, NEVER, NEVER, go alone.
Hooking up about 1 hours drive outside the city we went off road towards Big Red, a massive 300ft high sand dune. Big Red is located along the Hatta Road, its red colour comes from it’s high iron oxide content.
We spent the afternoon dune bashing and stopping frequently to retrieve various vehicles in our caravan, that had been launched into bushes or swallowed by sand dunes.
As dusk fell, we found a lovely spot to camp just in time to crack open the beers and watch the sun set.
Next we made a camp fire and sat chatting in it's orange haze, while the children played.
I prepared (not easy on an ankle height camping table) our gourmet Arabian desert feast of Hummus, Talbulah, warm pitta, vine leaves and kebabs. Taking out the pepper mill, I ground some fresh black pepper onto our delights and we ate them on proper plates with with real cutlery.
Yes I'd brought it all with me, because this is what Glamping means!! Effort = glamour!
We were of course mocked shamelessly for this by the 'more experienced' desert campers for our 'naive' choice of desert camping cuisines and receptacles.
Johan defending his part in these selections, by vehemently dening any involvement in the scented candle acquisition and siding with the prominently male audience, even grassing me up about the nail painting incident that made us late.
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| Quite glad of my 'fancy scarf ' stopping your head from burning off ah Johan! |
Well of course they were literally rolling around the floor laughing about this and I became the butt of all jokes.
Interesting, though that all changed when I offered around my exotic fruit salad and chocolate chip brownies and the 'more experience campers' who hadn't given a thought to desert desserts, very gratefully scoffed the lot.
More interesting still as the night wore on, some of them even quietly asked for my much maligned shinny wine glass and some Red wine, to go with the cheese and grape course I mustered up!
Plus, I later overhead one remark "oooh there's a lovely scent of peach & citrus coming from somewhere".
Throughout whilst outwardly renaming magnanimous, inside I was of course flicking the V's at everyone going "nan, nan - nann- nan" and doing a victory dance....
"Haha! - laugh at my Glamping will you!!!" As smug self-satisfaction settling over me for the remainder of the evening.
As the evening embered away whilst the children told stories around the camp fire and refused to got to sleep, the adults got hammered.
At this juncture I feel I need to tell tell you about the un-glamorous downsides of desert camping;
1) Drunkenly staggering around in the pitch dark desert trying to find a secluded place to dig a hole to wee in, whilst simultaneously trying to not get a scorpion in your knickers.2) Going at the wrong time of year (late May) so you wake up not only hung over but being boiled alive in your tent like a kipper.
3) Having sand in every single orifice and even emended in your crows feet
4) Having to suffer dune bashing all the way back with a hangover and wanting to vomit.
5) Due to 4) needing to get home desperately whilst others get stuck in the sand and leisurely stop to photograph wild life!
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