Dubai; End of Season Holiday 13th-21st of October.
Many people often ask me-what do you do for fun? I appear to be a very serious person so I read this question as- you seem to be a little boring!
The thing is, I am a very serious person especially during the race season and when talking business. But, I do have my fair share of fun! I’ll tell you in a minute what I do for fun but first….
While I was competing at the Commonwealth Games my mother who lives in Dubai was very sick. My step father David was there at the hospital everyday and while mum’s condition was not improving after one week in hospital, I was told she might not make it through… but once again, the tough cookie survived another scary battle.
When I arrived in Dubai a couple of days after the Commonwealth Games mum was released from Hospital and only needed to return for half days. The first thing I did with Mum was sat down and watched the end of the Commonwealth Games race on YouTube.
My mum was very weak and struggled to breathe for the first few days of my post season holiday in Dubai but by the end of my week there she was feeling much better and was able to join us on some outings.
Tiffany Cromwell (who rides for Lotto & Honda) joined me in Dubai for some extreme adventures!
The first thing we did when Tiff arrived was snowboarding at the Mall of Emirates indoor snow park called Ski Dubai. Neither of us had ever snowboarded before so it was great to learn in a controlled environment. We picked it up pretty quickly and found ourselves getting addicted -so we returned to the mall another few times during our trip. After our last lesson we were carving it up alone on the steepest slopes and we were also hitting the jump ramps and getting some air!
We did different activities everyday including;
A desert safari which included some extreme 4 wheel driving on the sand dunes, sand boarding down the dunes, camel riding, extreme dune buggy driving into the night, and a dinner in the desert with belly dancing entertainment.
A day of water sports including; Wake boarding, skiing, knee boarding, tube riding and Para Sailing.
Dubai’s biggest party of the year, Sandance. It was held on the beach at Atlantis and featured famous entertainers/artists including; Armand Van Helden. The party went from 2pm to 2am.
One night we went to the Dubai Mall and had dinner with a view of the dancing fountain which is the world’s tallest performing fountain shooting water 150m/500ft high, equivalent to that of a 50 storey building. The fountains in Dubai were created by California based- WET who designed and created the famous fountains at the Bellagio in Las Vegas.
The tallest completed building in Dubai is the 828 metre (2,717 ft) Burj Khalifa which is officially the tallest building, freestanding structure, and man-made structure of any kind ever built on the planet.
Whilst the fountain was not placing, during intervals we had a great view of the Burj Khalifa from Dinner, we later decided to go and check in out inside.
Inside the Burj Khalifa we also went to the Armani Prive club (in the Armani Hotel) which was closed for the shooting of a Pepsi advertisement for the evening but we were invited onto the terrace after being given a private tour of the club. They were not allowed to say who the famous person was, ? We will see the ad worldwide in one month.
Another nice club/bar we went to on the Thursday night was called Barasti on the beach. It was a nice place to meet people; there were a lot of British people there!
The pinnacle of our night life was the Cavali club, we went there twice, the first night we met some popular locals and staff (all high class people- we felt under dressed in our best dresses) so we returned there on our last night in Dubai to attend a Dubai fashion shoot after party. This was Tiffany’s heaven, a 7 star bar/club filled with designers and photographers! After an amazing meal at the Cavali club we were invited into the private lounge to be filmed and photographed, the TV host will send me the link to the feature next week.
Our trip was adrenalin packed; we were on the go all the time and we were constantly overwhelmed by the place, the people and the way of life there- the high life.
Thanks mum for having us and sorry it took 5 years to get me there- I’m sure I’ll be back again before another 5 years!
Click here to view the photo’s of our extreme holiday!