The Fascinating city of Dubai

Dubai is a splendid city located in the Persian Gulf at the crossroads between Europe, Africa and Asia. One of the fastest growing cities in the world, Dubai is the second largest emirate after Abu Dhabi. This article on Dubai Travel Guide will take you through some of the most important and exciting things to see and do in Dubai, and about the people, places and food in the city.

 

Dubai attractions are such that it entices most people to visit this city and enjoy the Dubai Culture. With the low cost airlines and Business Class Air Tickets, visiting Dubai has become very easy and convenient. Dubai is essentially a desert city with great infrastructure, moderate policies, and excellent tourist facilities.

The best time to visit Dubai is from November to April as it is considered as the coolest weather of the year. So, these months are regarded as the most convenient time for Dubai Travel Guide and to explore the Dubai Culture. For the rest of the months, it is very difficult to explore the city fully and in relaxed mood as the climatic conditions during that tie is unsuitable. When you pack for your Dubai trip, do remember to pack a pair of sunglasses, a hat and sun block.

Dubai is the place to be in for food lovers as it offers a large number of good restaurants and a wide option of eating-places to choose from. These eating joints are also counted as Dubai Attractions and lure most of the visitors in this city. In your Dubai Travel Guide, do include a trip to some of these best restaurants and eat the best of cuisines from all parts of the world.

Shopping in Dubai is one of the popular events. The city offers a festive lifestyle to millions of its tourists each year. A number of shopping festivals and trade fairs keep this city and its people quite busy throughout the year. Dubai Travel Guide cannot be completed without your favorite activity, shopping. The Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF), also known as ‘Layali Dubai’ in Arabic was started in 1996 and is celebrated as one of the most happening shopping festivals in the city every year.

A few other things that can be done while in Dubai includes spending time in the beaches or go for a Desert Safari or Dune Bashing, skiing, cruising, golfing and so on. The city is divided as Old Dubai and modern Dubai. And both these parts offer extreme beauty of its own in its unique way.

The hotels is Dubai provide world-class accommodation with five-star services and superb amenities. Dubai offers an extensive range of accommodations in any price range for the business traveler or vacationer. A vacation in Dubai is no less than a fantasy trip and takes away all your worries. With Lowest Asia flight tickets, this vacation is going to be a far better option for most people.

So, go ahead and enjoy your Dubai Travel Guide and have wonderful time in this modern and progressive city of the UAE.

Mike Federer is an associate editor for the website http://www.lowest-ticket.com

It is committed to providing visitors with complete information on Asia, Africa, Europe tourist attractions, lowest ticket deals, cheap Asia flight tickets, travel information through Dubai travel guide, airfare to Dubai, Manila and around the entire world

The Palm Islands of Dubai

Dubai’s Palm Islands are the world’s largest man-made island clusters. Sometimes they are also called the eight wonder of the world. These are located at three different places across Dubai’s coast, namely Jumeirah, Jebel Ali and Deira. These islands, which are also known as The Palm Dubai or Dubai Palm are layered with rocks and sand upon a ten meter deep seabed. Sand meant for laying down these sites is obtained by dredging in the nearby sea. The Belgian dredging firm Jan De Nul and its Dutch counterpart Van Oord have been supervising the whole operation. Work is in an advanced stage in Jumeirah and Jebel Ali while it has also picked up in the Deira section.

Dredging ships propel sand over an area, which is decided by the coordinates of Differential Global Positioning System (DGPS). This process is called rain-bowing; the name is indicative of the arc which is created due to the falling sand here. Each Dubai Palm has a breakwater constructed at its periphery, which provides it a separation from the murky seawaters. These breakwaters are constructed by laying down several layers of rocks over the seabed by sea vessels. These vessels are called pontoons and the split-hopper barges. The Jumeirah Palm alone required a staggering 7 million tons of rocks to construct its breakwater.

Each of these Dubai Palm Islands is designed to depict a date palm tree, with a trunk, a crown and several fronds. The crescent islands at the periphery are assigned to play the role of breakwaters. The construction of the Palm Jebel Ali was started by Jan De Nul in 2002 and completed by the year-end of 2006. It required a 4 km long peninsula to be built, surrounded by a 200m wide and a 17 km long breakwater. This asked for reclaiming roughly 135,000,000 m³ of rock, sand and limestone. About 5,000,000 m³ of rocks were needed for strengthening the slope.

Dubai Palm islands, which are bound to increase Dubai’s costal length by an additional 520 km, will host water theme parks, luxury hotels, shopping malls, freehold villas, furnished beach apartments, health spas and similar other facilities. It was always Sheikh Maktoum’s dream to see Dubai grow in free trade and tourism, and that’s how these islands were conceived. The UAE property developer, Nakheel Properties, is supervising this whole work.

The Palm Jumeirah, which is 5 kilometers by 5 kilometers in size, will have a crown with 17 fronds, and a surrounding 11 kilometer-long breakwater. It will create 4,000 new homes over the period of next 3 to 4 years and add 78 kilometers to Dubai’s shoreline. In fact, the residents began moving into their Palm Jumeirah homes by the year-end 2006, five years after the dredging in the area had begun taking place.

The Palm Jebel Ali, which is expected to be the home of 1.7 million people by the year 2020, will be completed by the year 2008. It will be much larger in size compared to the Palm Jumeirah, however, the tag of largest one will go to the Palm Deira, which is expected to be completed by the year 2015. Due to its mammoth size, the construction of Palm Deira is expected to take place in several phases. Dubai’s tourism sector will heavily rely on these Dubai Palm Islands for its revenue, once they fully got completed.

Dubai hotels United Arab Emirates

Dubai’s skyline has grown in the recent years by an amount, which took over a century for the developed nations to achieve in their own backyard. In Dubai’s case, it was the oil exploration at first, and then the commerce of free trade zones, which made it be counted at par with the developed nations. The desire to see its tourism sector prosper and the gains of a thriving economy, were the two major reasons why Dubai’s skyline grew so frantically in the last two decades. In the course of events, the city also became the new residing place for world class hotels. Gone were the heydays of Sydney, London, New York and Tokyo. Dubai hotels were also standing at par, shoulder-to-shoulder, eyeball-to-eyeball with them. Today’s Dubai offers several dozen of world class hotels to make your stay comfortable. Apart from Dubai hotels (United Arab Emirates) one can choose from many other options, like furnished villas and beach side apartments, to make one’s stay at ease.

Let us examine the following data to learn more about Dubai hotels. Until the early 90s, they were not to be found in so many numbers out there. By the start of 2000 however, this ground reality had dramatically transformed. One s gets awed by looking at their numbers these days. This author counted on just one site and found more than three dozen entries for the five-star facility alone. The count for the four, three and two star hotels will be even more awesome, one reckons. There were a total of 414 hotels in Dubai in the year 2006. They were the mainstay for accommodating the 6.5 million visitors who visited the city that year. The revenues earned by these hotels stood at Dh10.8b in the same period. This however grew by 15.74 percent to be at Dh12.5b in the year 2007. This also discloses the stress on Dubai hotels (United Arab Emirates), furnished villas and Dubai hotel apartments in their attempts to cope with the level of demand they face from the industry.

This is why Dubai’s government has nodded to too many new plans that promised to construct newer furnished villas, furnished apartments and Dubai hotels (United Arab Emirates) on its territory. The total number of rooms stood at 40,862 in all these segments, in the year 2006. This will have to be further raised by a handsome margin to meet with the set official target of receiving 15 million visitors by the year 2010. Two key events, one of which was recently held, and the other still on, are expected to help Dubai in meeting out with its 2010 target. The first was Dubai’s 1st Tourism Development Projects and Investment Market (TDIM) exhibition, which was to be held from January 20-22, 2008. Major real estate companies from all over the world were expected to showcase projects worth over $190 billion. The idea behind it was to get various components of Dubai’s urban growth together, namely real estate firms, private companies, investors and government bodies, and frame out the future course of action.

The other event, which is taking place across Dubai right now, is the 13th Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF). This will coincide with many recreational programs at places like shopping malls, Dubai hotels and elsewhere, apart from the shopping mania that the festival was all about.

Burj Dubai Skyscraper

Dubai’s upcoming landmark, Burj Dubai Tower, is creating ripples around the world. The building is expected to be completed by September 2009, and it will stand to be the world’s tallest at that time. Emaar, a UAE construction giant developing it, has yet not disclosed its official height, but the building is expected to measure above 800m on its completion. There will be more than 160 floors and a 200m high spire carrying various communication equipments in the entire building. Most of its first 108 floors will be lent either to house one of Dubai hotels or to accommodate private apartment owners, however, the business community will also have its own share in the form of exclusive offices.

Dubai’s government has worked for over two decades now with intent to shifting away from the chiefly oil driven economy to a diversified free-trade, retail and tourism oriented one. They have succeeded as well in doing so to a very large extent, since the share of oil revenues in the GDP has fallen drastically in the last few years. However, they will require continuing on to make this transformation last permanently, and that’s where the projects like Burj Dubai Tower, Dubai Marina, The World, The Palm Islands, The Dubai Mall, serviced apartments and various Dubai hotels come into this picture.

Dubai is expecting to receive 15 million visitors by the year 2010, and needs to add more supplies in the hospitality and retail sectors by that time. The Downtown Burj Dubai, which is going to host the Burj Dubai Tower, apart from many other developments, is expected to fulfill this growing need. The township will have nine Dubai hotels, over a dozen and half residential towers, one low-rise township called The Old Town, the world’s largest mall, The Dubai Mall, and loads of leisure outlets such as cafes, stylish boutiques, restaurants etc to add more to its charm.

The Downtown Burj Dubai will provide roughly 30,000 serviced apartments, penthouses, villas and several Dubai hotels for staying in the city. The 63-story tall Dubai Lake Hotel & Serviced Apartments is one of these projects, which will offer exclusive apartments and studios for outright sale. The tower will also host a 210-room luxury hotel, which will be managed by a leading luxury hotel group. Another housing development is called Boulevard Crescents, which will comprise of 1, 2 and 3 bedroom luxury residential suits and penthouses. A very beautiful landscape encircling these apartments will add more value to one’s stay in Dubai.

The world’s largest mall, The Dubai Mall, is also located in the same area, where you can find the goods of your preference to fulfill your desires. This retail giant will house over a dozen built-in smaller malls, each catering to the needs of an individual market. The mall will be spreading over an area of 12.1 million ft², and will begin its operations by August 2008. These developments, along with the spirited rise of the tower Burj Dubai, are bound to add a significant amount of growth in the city’s tourism and retail sectors.