Divine Dubai
We stayed at the luxurious 5 star Westin Mina Seyahi Beach Resort and Marina which has a superb location on Jumeirah beach.
It also has an excellent choice of restaurants ranging from the Blue Orange for breakfast which also offers themed international buffets in the evening, Hunters Grill for steak lovers, Bussola for Italian flavours and the Spice Emporium offering a range of authentic Thai dishes. There is also the Bubbalicious buffet on a Friday lunchtime which is renowned in Dubai and offers unlimited, champagne, and wine and a fabulous choice of food from all of the restaurants for approx. £90 per head. For soaking up the sun, the resort has several swimming pools in the spacious grounds, a private beach and pool bars offering drinks and lunch. For drinks in the evening there is the Senyar bar with TV’s and piped music or the Oeno wine bar which has live music plus outdoors the popular Barasti bar.
For a change of scene on a couple of evenings we took a short taxi ride to eat at Chinese & Lebanese restaurants in the Mall of the Emirates which contains 520 shops and 85 restaurants and food outlets. You can’t have alcohol but the food is very good. We also visited the Souk Madinat which comprises of shops, restaurants and hotels situated on a small canal network Venice style. We also explored the Dubai Mall which has a mind boggling 1200 shops and 160 restaurants and food outlets as well as an Aquarium, Ice Skating Rink and Cinema complex.
Having visited Dubai many years earlier we had seen the sights in the city area and had dinner on a cruise down the Creek. Therefore we opted for a half day Catamaran cruise which departed from the marina at the Westin resort and sailed around the Jumeirah Palm anchoring for a BBQ lunch before returning to the Marina. We also enjoyed an evening excursion to the Babs Al Shams Desert Resort for a superb BBQ and live show which included an Arabian pageant on horseback plus a belly dancer!
Dubai is a great place for a winter break from the UK with excellent hotels, restaurants, shopping and things to see and do as well as ideal temperatures between October and March.
Oh I nearly forgot, we also attended the wedding and reception which all took place at the Jumeirah Beach Hotel on the beach in front of the iconic Burj Al Arab Hotel. Fantastic!