This video follows the second half of our second day in Dubai. Even before leaving the hotel, we knew it would be a long day! Our adventuring to-do list included Old Dubai, Downtown Dubai, the world-famous mall, world’s tallest building, an exhilarating water show and our chance to eat at a legendary restaurant.
Just typing the overview is tiring!
Why do so much in one day?
We’re not fans of over-filled itineraries or fast-paced vacations. A quick look at any of our videos and it’s easy to see we like to take our time at every stop on our adventures. We can spend a decent amount of time at an interesting site or location only to have the footage or photographs fill a small part a video.
Unfortunately, this slower pace battles with reality. Like most, we have real jobs and consequently, limited vacation. As we all know, fitting travel adventures into these small windows of freedom can be challenging. In the case of Dubai and not knowing when we would make it back again, we squeezed in as much as we could.
Of course, there’s always the added frustrations of discovering far more to do at any particular location once you get there.
A closer look at what we explore in this video
We were truly in the Old Dubai frame of mind when we took the taxi across the city to Downtown Dubai and the world-famous Dubai Mall. There was a bit of a mental adjustment as we climbed out of the taxi and wandered into the opulent Dubai Mall.
Part of the 20-billion-dollar downtown complex, called Downtown Dubai, the Dubai Mall sits next to the iconic Burj Khalifa, which is mostly entered through the mall. Enjoying a total retail floor area of 502,000 square meters, the mall includes over 1,200 shops.
There are a lot of numbers thrown around for the number of visitors the Dubai Mall enjoys, ranging from 84 million in 2019 to a current figure of 100 million given on the Dubai Mall’s website. We went with the latter for the video’s narration.
Aside from the shops, the mall includes Dubai Aquarium and Underwater Zoo, VR Park Dubai, Hysteria (a haunted house), and Dubai Dino.
With a total height of 829.8 m (2,722 ft, or just over half a mile) and a roof height (excluding antenna, but including a 242.6 m spire) of 828 m (2,717 ft), the Burj Khalifa has been the tallest structure and building in the world since 2009.
Sad news following our Big Adventure
We were saddened to read the founder behind Din Tai Fung, the famous steamed dumpling restaurant featured in our video, Yang Bing-Yi passed away according to a statement from the company on March 29th, 2023.
Wendy read the news on NPR, who wrote:
Yang and his wife Lai Pen-mei started the Din Tai Fung restaurant in 1972, and grew their location in Taipei into a chain of more than 170 globally, popularizing piping-hot steamed soup dumplings in Taiwan and beyond.
Din Tai Fung is generally credited with popularizing the thin-skinned, soup-filled dumplings called xiao long bao worldwide. They’re so popular now that even Trader Joe’s has its own version.
Travelers and foodies alike may find the full story interesting and can be read here.
Travel tips for this area
There’s a lot to do in Downtown Dubai, with a full schedule of activates easily stretching into days. A few things may encourage visitors to pace themselves over several visits to the mall itself, and more about that in the ‘Behind the Scenes’ section below.
While everyone has their own level of travel planning, an easy adage for Downtown Dubai could be, ‘The more you want to do, the more you should plan’. This would include booking tickets for the various attractions as well as understanding the general layout of Downtown Dubai.
If heat isn’t an issue, midday is a great time to wander Burj Khalifa Lake, watch some of the mini-water shows and walk the beautiful modern center.
Overall, it’s an amazing area with time easily stolen through amazing stores, unique features and of course getting lost in the mall. A lot.
Behind the scenes (possible spoilers)
If this is your first time reading a ‘closer look’ at one of our YouTube videos, watch the video before reading any further. There may be possible spoilers!
As mentioned in other posts, this trip was the first travel adventure we knew would make it onto YouTube. While there aren’t as many moments of speaking to the camera as a modern travel Vlog, even one would’ve been more than seen in any prior trips. And yes, we do plan on publishing past travel adventures, low resolutions and all!
Why was Wendy tired?
We started the day early, wandered up the waterside area known as The Creek and then through the various souks, or markets. Again, only a fraction of the wandering through the souks is included in the prior video (Dubai Day Two – Part One) because we’re quick to admit our every traveling moment isn’t the most intriguing of entertainment. There was a lot of walking throughout a day that slowly warmed up.
It was past midday by the time we arrived at the Dubai Mall, add in time for navigating the mall, confirming tickets for the Burj Khalifa, grabbing lunch and wandering around a little bit more, it’s easy to understand Wendy hitting the proverbial exhaustive wall.
Add to this Dubai is a busy place and the effort of navigating constant crowds and a continuous din of people certainly tugs at the energy levels.
The Burj Khalifa Time Warp
A great example of taking time at the more amazing sites seen on our adventures, the Burj Khalifa is featured in the video for around three minutes. In reality we spent about three hours on the Sky level taking in the amazing sights, attempting to shoot around reflections cast by the glass walls and around a multitude of tourists.
The Burj Khalifa observation area gets pretty packed, and with tourists from around the world the level of courtesy varies drastically. This is sort of seen in the footage of the Dubai sunset (08:25), the small blip was caused by someone nearly pushing me over trying to find some space in the glass wall for their own picture. It was edited out, but the sunset seems to skip!
Finally, everyone needs to thank Wendy for the incredible footage of the Dubai Fountains from the top of the Burj Khalifa. While I may have shot it, Wendy used her jacket to create a cocoon around me, blocking any light or reflections from the glass. It looked silly while we did it and took much longer than either of us thought to get it right, but the result was amazing.
Thousands of your closest friends
Both a ‘Behind the scenes’ and travel tip, the viewing area around the Burj Khalifa Lake fills up very quickly. While we found a spot early, it was stunning to see how quickly the crowds formed around and behind us. One minute it was your average everyday crowd, the next minute it was as if the latest, greatest pop star was performing.
Again, with tourists around the world, expect some pushing and shoving with others trying to push into imaginary spaces to watch the water fountain show.
A mall to test any relationship
We had hoped to visit much more in Dubai Mall. Between running low on energy and consequently enthusiasm, our adventurous spirit was dialed way back from where it normally sits. Add getting lost in the mall to the lackluster attitude and there wasn’t even a quick visit to the Dubai Dino or aquarium. We did try to find these, but after the third time of apparently heading in the wrong direction, we gave up.
Finally, the Dubai Mall is like a bad relationship. Easy to get into but very difficult getting out of.
Taxi’s are caught at taxi stations and the line for these was incredibly long! After standing in line for about 45 minutes, you’re pointed at a row of parked taxis and it suddenly becomes a test from the ‘Hunger Games’. Everyone quickly realizes they’re on their own, resulting in a group of ten or fifteen people walking quickly, and some cases running, to grab one of the available cars.
Seriously, you felt like touching the side of the nearest taxi and screaming ‘mine’!
A perplexing experience at the end of an exhaustive day.
