Bye Bye Dubai - Back to Desert France
We spend our last day in Sharjah. This other emirate, just 10 kilometers from Dubai is deemed authentic and more fundamentalist. Several museums have looks interesting. We start the onslaught of Sharjah under a blazing sun. Our lonely planet is expired a few minutes after starting the tour of the city. We are entering a house recommended for its architecture and art galleries. After a few moments a man comes to us by teaching us that there is nothing to visit here since the offices have been constructed. It directs us to another museum strongly recommended by the guide. This museum is located in the center of a very beautiful, but when entering a sign "closed for renovation" stop us.
We decided to fall back on the historical center of the city is empty. The Islamic Museum, the other museum that attracted our attention is also closed. We headed to a gallery of calligraphy in which the person in charge of welcoming us that in reality the Islamic Museum has just moved.
Armed with a map we will update to the museum where we visit a gallery devoted to the history and explanation of religion. A second gallery we had different inventions that the Muslim world has developed throughout the years from a scientific perspective, astronomy or medicine. We finished by art galleries.
After that we left for Dubai, Sharjah somewhat disappointed despite his buildings.
We finish the day by visiting the various souks, one of the spices and perfumes. We then prepare our luggage for the return France.
is the end of the trip, we're back in France after 7am flight and a nice surprise to our respective parents. We hope you enjoyed reading our blog, it will serve other passengers, or has given some want to go, and especially that it has occupied your working hours.
And to close this blog, a wonderful quotation from ourselves that we will not hesitate to highlight each interview:
"We do not have a penny but this experience has enriched us for life"
We leave you to ponder on this sentence worthy of writing a student 10 years.
See ya!
PS: We welcome your generous donations to fund our future travel plans. Thank you in advance.
1 year road trip in Australia with working holiday visa and WHV our beautiful van
It's over ...
Here we are in Dubai for a few days. The backpacks are placed in the center of the old city. And yes Dubai has some interesting history of which we hear little about.
Yet the center has lots of charm, bisected by the Dubai Creek, take a boat traditional "Dhow" for the cross. Expatriation insured with the visit of the various souks, the district Bastakia and traditional architecture, minarets, mosques ...
Passage through the Dubai Museum located in an old fort. Very interestingly, we see dramatic changes the small fishing port of pearls and traders to the city we know today.
We ended the day with a "sheesha" along the Dubai Creek and visit the "Heritage Village" completely inanimate unfortunately that night.
On Friday (special day for Muslims), many things are closed. And men come to pray at the mosque. An impressive world to the great mosque. But people look wickedly C. in the street. Maybe women are prohibited output on Friday ... We saw virtually no on that day. We hopes that things will go better the next days.
We realized how the UAE is a cosmopolitan country. Iranian, Indian, Pakistani, African, European, one is to wonder if we have only met a genuine inhabitant of this country!
Back at the hotel where we have a beautiful view.
The call to prayer at 5am was included in the price of the bedroom.
We stayed a few more days in Ko Tao. We found a cheap 20s bungalow to the beach. The sun came out for two days, the beach is beautiful, a true piece of paradise. So we chillin in the shade of a palm tree on the sand of the beach, sipping a cocktail by the sea, in water at a beautiful watch sunset.
The next two days, we returned the wrong time. We still went to Hing Wong Bay on the other side of the island (4km walk but it rises). Nice point of view and especially beautiful snorkelling. We rented a mask and snorkel and hop we corals and exotic fish. We saw several parrotfish, butterfly fish, trigger fish and even a. Very good afternoon. The rest of the time we prepared our stopover in Dubai and especially ...
As this is our last day in Thailand, we caught up. In the list of things to do, we still had to make major Thai specialties such as Thai boxing, Thai massage, the revelry on the beach and of course Ladyboys.
For Thai boxing, we've only seen a drive and there were about 50% of Europeans, half were women (real, not ladyboy). We can not say that we have seen the cream of Thai boxing, but it was nice. For the fights, we've seen enough TV to broadcast our favorite restaurant (the cheapest) from Koh Tao.
And we finally decided to offer Thai massage. Since that time we advised ... So for those unfamiliar with Thai massage, it looks like Thai boxing. All shots are allowed, knees, elbows, fists, kicks. But unlike boxing, you can not retaliate. You're a punching bag. Well it's a bit exaggerated, in the end we still feel better (when it ends).
We met a very nice French. F. If you read us ... We spent a very pleasant evening in a lively bar on the beach. There was also a Canadian minesweeper end ("What is your room number F?") And a English. Good music and good atmosphere.
Oh and what everyone is waiting for Laidiesboy! Finally something crusty on this blog ^ ^. Not so in fact it was a cabaret show (free, must not kidding). And frankly it was a good laugh. Provided one or two have been made and that deludes so many others ... well it's not terrible. Including our little darling, we must imagine Magloire (Thai version) with a wig and a slinky dress. We always have nightmares. A thought for the English who had to participate in the show.
Perhaps the last picture of our stay Thais remain a good impression!
The seabed of Koh Tao Ko Pha Ngan
Presentation
Here we are in Koh Tao Island Thailand most famous for diving. This reputation is due to several reasons:
- is one of the cheapest places in the world to learn to dive;
- Sometimes you can see whale sharks (there are about 5 places in the world can see, including Australia);
- There is the Triggerfish, a territorial fish can be violent if they are approached too;
- Lots of clown fish (Nemo) live near Koh Tao.
So here we are armed with our PADI open water in search of a diving school where we can get our advanced diploma. The hardest thing is not to find but to choose a diving school, the island is invaded by amateurs and professionals of the seabed. For the choice we made it very simple because when we were on the boat to Koh Tao there were already some diving schools represented and the quality / price was inconclusive. Here we parties for "Coral Grand Resort and Others".
School / Dive Resort
Once arrived at the resort we have to negotiate prices because there is a big difference between what was presented to us on the boat and what we propose to arrival. Not to mention the room that bears no resemblance to what we had shown in photo. After an hour of serious negotiation we can get what we want and emménageons. We begin our PADI advanced two days later.
PADI Advanced
This new diploma We are spending five specialty dives. We choose from a list of specialization. In this list some specialties are not available in the diving school and other needs to pay extra so. So there were only 6 or 7 specialties available on the possible fifteen.
Among the five dives are required to make two specialties: deep diving and underwater navigation. A third is strongly advised, the mastery of buoyancy. We then selected the fish identification and naturalist (the observation and understanding of marine life). The program is loaded.
Until school starts, we were able to swim at a beautiful beach on the first night. Despite the clouds we felt that the water is turquoise as the sun comes out. The second day was a day rain. So we read our books to prepare for the dive.
first day of diving
We are fortunate to have a French instructor, even if the German student who had accompanied us to feel alone at times. We review the contents of the book quickly and start to do 3 dives in the afternoon: navigation, mastery of buoyancy and naturalist. We jumped at Mango Bay.
The first two dives were mainly composed of exercises under water. We still saw a Triggerfish. The visibility was not great, only 10 meters. The dives lasted about forty minutes each. Many fish and coral but nothing to do with Australia.
The third dive was more free, just observation, by cons it lasted only 20 minutes. We were frankly disappointed by the duration of the dive, due to constraints of time use the other student and optimization of working time of the monitor. We still saw beautiful corals, different from those of Australia.
2nd day
Depart 6am direction Chumphon Pinnacles, one of the best sites in the area. That's where we can see the whale sharks and shark gray. We send our deep dive to 30 meters. Again, visibility 10 meters only. Many urchins were placed on sand or coral. We have not had the chance to see sharks, but the site was rich in coral. We "flew" the fields of anemones.
last dive at White Rock, a shoal of barracuda waiting for us under the boat. We crossed a lot of fish and especially a beautiful moray eel swimming at the bottom. Here we
graduates of our PADI Advance.
We are forced to compare what we saw in Thailand with the sites of Australia. There is no contest, the Great Barrier Reef is much better. Here we mainly observed the coral and some fish at the bottom, scattered. In Australia we were faced with walls of coral with an incredible diversity of fish. It must be said that visibility was not terrible in Thailand, because of poor weather (rain and wind) and the site of Chumphon Pinnacle should be fantastic with clear water.
One last regret, we have not crossed Nemo ... We go still happy to have our diploma.
The following photos are not related to days spent diving but give you a preview of Koh Tao.
