DJStroky

Honestly, for all the hype about this place, I was disappointed. The first thing that ticked me off was that it is a little hard to get to using mass transit (an important issue for me). I took a cab from Mall of the Emirates station and asked my cab driver to take me to the monorail station on the mainland. He told me that it wasn’t open and instead drove me out to Atlantis. Well, he was wrong the station on the mainland was open and I paid probably an extra 15 Dirhams more than I should’ve for this taxi ride.

By the time I got onto the monorail at Atlantis it was already getting dark so I couldn’t really see anything. The monorail was also really slow and wobbly compared to Dubai Metro. When I had gotten to the Gateway station I decided I had seen enough and took a taxi back to Mall of the Emirates station to take the metro back.

Now I totally agree that the Palm is an engineering wonder of the world. However the scale of it is a little hard to consume unless you’re looking at it from an airplane or a really tall skyscraper from the Dubai Marina. When you’re driving along the trunk it feels like a slower version of Sheikh Zayed road except less magnificent – even more so on the monorail.

Dubai was really fun. After visiting here, it seems to me that there are three different parts of Dubai.

• The first is the glamorous, expensive and business parts, such as the Burj Al Arab, the Burj Dubai and of course the Palm Jumeirah. One can easily spend as much as they wanted here. The business areas are wonders and the Burj Dubai is amazingly tall. The touristy areas such as the Palm Jumeirah were a bit too touristy for my taste.
• Then there is the more traditional areas of Dubai such as Deira and Bur Dubai. A lot more activity is concentrated in these places and often times, really cheap and good food can be found. Just walk a few minutes and you will probably find some Shawarma for less than 25 Dirhams (about $7 USD). The souks have some excellent deals especially after bargaining off the original price quoted. Although I didn’t buy this particular item I negotiated a price originally at 165 Dirhams down to 135.
• Finally, there are the places like International City which are out in the middle of the desert (aka nowhere) for now. But perhaps 20 years from now they’ll be within reasonable distance of development. These kinds of places is where a lot of the working class and taxi drivers live.

Dubai also felt like a great city to do business in. I met numerous people, exchanged business cards and talked briefly about what the business climate is like even with people in different fields. I went in November and it was typically in the 90s during the day. Can’t imagine what it would’ve been like in the middle of the summer.

I went to a Twilight Exit down at 25th & Cherry.

There is a new section of O’Malley’s that has a bunch of late night munchies. I got some popcorn shrimp with fries. Delic!

Oh man, the beer is so good here. and it is right by the ferry. This is one of my favorite if not the best brewpub I have been to in the Northwest.

This was a fun visit since a group of 10 of us took over this lounge area with really comfy chairs. Probably wouldn’t have gone here though if it weren’t for the company picking up the tab, the quality was a little higher than what I should be spending for.

I was seated with my party in less than a minute ordered food and fish the next, and received an excellent ahi tuna plate five minutes later. Excellent service and a killer view.

I’ve been here for two purchases/services and each time received excellent customer service.

First, I was about to try to take home some skiis that they repaired on my bicycle, but the ski mechanic offered to drop them off at my house since it was on his way. I didn’t have to worry about my fixed skiis getting scratched up all over again.

Secondly, I went in here to buy a tent and sleeping bag, but found out that the tents were a bit too high-end for me, so they referred me to REI. I ended up getting a cheap tent there, but came back for a sleeping bag since they had a better deal. And after that I was about to buy a $125 jacket until one of the clerks told me it probably wasn’t going to be a good piece of clothing for bicycling – this advice was really appreciated.

I’ve been really happy with the service here and will likely stop by in the future for any winter sports or other stuff. Oh also, these guys were twice as knowledgeable about the gear as the guys at the REI in Tacoma. I give my highest recommendations to this shop.

A place where you can easily spend $50 per person for a meal.

go there during happy hour for the Nachos. They are immense.