Doha to Al Ain

One of the first things you notice when arriving in the UAE from Qatar is how much more organised everything is. Maybe it is still being organised in the Middle Eastern kind of way (and maybe it is more to do with a certain mismanaged former employer in Qatar rather than the country itself), but the experience was very different.

Unfortunately we saw nothing of Abu Dhabi as we were collected from the airport and driven directly to the Intercontinental in Al Ain. But no sooner had we left the airport and hit the highway, the driver (obviously he does have a name and is very efficient and helpful) started handing over various bits and pieces like a welcome pack, staff ID card, and some cash to cover our meals while at the hotel, along with a great deal of information and answers to questions (which of course was overload and we forgot most of it straight away).

The highway connecting Abu Dhabi and Al Ain is pretty impressive. 6 lanes with lights all the way with lots of greenery on either side along with small farms and towns which give way to “real” desert. The signs say 120 kph, but I think they did an open speed limit trial for a while and the result of that is you don’t get flashed by the speed cameras unless you are going over 180 kph. About 140ish seems the speed of choice, but no matter how fast you go someone is always going faster.

Two things of note is the road really is that good it doesn’t matter how fast you go (within reason), and there is only one real “corner” where you go around and over some dunes not long before you reach Al Ain. Not that the highway is straight as it does weave gently from direction to another just enough to keep it interesting along with the gradual change in dunes from "sand" sand-coloured to "red" sand-coloured closer to Al Ain (you know what I mean).

Arriving in Al Ain for the first time is a little strange (especially mid afternoon on the weekend coming from Doha). I think the first thing that struck us was that there was actual scenery with the wide tree-lined roads (which were almost comatose compared to Doha), Jebel Hafeet rising up at one end of the city (which is pretty impressive when you have seen nothing but barren flatness for so long), and the number of date palms (it really is a desert oasis). When you add the fact that everything seems established and clean rather than under construction, it just makes for a completely different vision than the one provided in Doha for so long.