Holiday in Dubai

One of the many problems with working full time and trying to race competitively is trying to get leave from work that coincides with bike races that need traveling or multi-stage races.

This scenario I was able to organise a week of leave three months in advance. This was the first leave period I was taking in one year and one month! Because I had to organise this three months in advance as well as organising the over seas travel that it also entailed, it is very difficult to find the best time period that fits in with my training and racing schedule as well! There was not much time to think! The leave was granted and the flights needed to be booked otherwise we would loose out on the good air fare rate. Unfortunately this time period coincided with the week of the Cape Epic. At the time of organising the holiday, I wasn't going to be able to do the Cape Epic. Little did I know that much closer to the time an opportunity to compete in the Epic came my way and obviously it was too late for me to scrap all the holiday plans and of coarse all the money that had already been spent.

Jayde and I were off to Dubai. What an awesome holiday it was! I had an amazing time and it was even better that I got to spend it with my number one girl and also to see my sister Tracy and Evan for the first time in 18 months! There is so much to do there and I think we did just about everything in the 8-days we were there!

- Two water parks: Wild Wadi and Atlantis hotel
- Desert safari 4x4 extreme dune bashing
- Indoor snow skiing
- Chilling on the beach at Mamzar, teaching Jayde to body-surf
- Travelling through two of the other Emirates: Sharjah and Fujairah, seeing the desert mountains, swimming and snorkeling around Snoopy Island rock where we swam with a turtle!
- Shopping at 5 different malls
- Seeing the worlds tallest building and the amazing fountain show from all perspectives (even from the 63 floor of the Address building at night!)
- We even got to go tubing behind a boat in the warm blue waters of the Gulf and seeing Dubai from the sea
- We also got to go to Tracy and Evans church and see Evan at his best leading worship

So Dubai was my first overseas holiday without involving some form of racing and what a great time it was! Now getting back home it is time to reduce the calorie intake and increase the time on the bike! Next race MTN mountain biking cross-country national in Maritzburg followed by the MTN mountain biking marathon national in Clarens.