A weeks holiday (staycation) in Dubai

Living abroad means we get lots of visitors, from family and friends to colleagues. Some are just passing through on their travels and stop with us for a day or two. Some are here with work and stay in hotels and we meet up for dinner. Others come solely for the purpose of visiting us.

We love having visitors, but we have to keep reminding ourselves we're not on holiday and it can get quite tiring and expensive, especially when Peter is at work or day, or our visitors stick to their own timescale and we're hanging around wondering if they'll be back for dinner or are eating out.

Since the kids left home, managing visitors is easier, no school runs to stick to and less cleaning. However the cat and dog have added to our stress when we have visitors due to not letting the cat outside and the dog being over fed.

But now it's just Peter and I. The cat and dog relocated to the UK last month. My MIL is looking after them while I'm out in Dubai for 3 weeks.

So what have we done this week?

Our friends arrived late on Friday night, quick tour of the house, a drink, chat and off to bed.

I didn't go in to most of these attractions as I've done them numerous times over the years. I will go if a friend or family member travels on their own, but otherwise I just wander around, shop and drink coffee.

I've added photos taken this week and the links are to old blog posts written at the time of my first visit to each place.

Saturday The Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi, a quick visit to Yas Mall and the Ferrari world shop, calling in at the liquor store then to the supermarket to buy sausages and steak for a BBQ in the garden. We exploded all the myths about Dubai in one day.

Sunday Boat trip from the Marina to the Creek and a visit to the souks, lunch and driverless train back to the Marina, home and dinner in the garden.

Monday The Burj Khalifa, Dubai Mall and the aquarium. We watched the fountains and had lunch together. We drove home via Ras Al Khor Nature Reserve to see the flamingos.

Tuesday A visit to the Souk Madinat for coffee with views of the Burj Al Arab. Then off to The Mall of the Emirates, Dubai Miracle Gardens and met Peter after work at Global Village for dinner.

Wednesday Off to the beach, then our visitors were collected mid afternoon for a desert safari.

Thursday Off to the Frame, then dropped visitors off at Dubai Mall for them to do some shopping  Out for dinner in the evening.

The next lot of visitors arrive on Monday morning, we'll be repeating a lot of the same trips. The beach on Monday and a BBQ. Tuesday the Ferry trip, but they will go on their own and I will drive to the Creek to show them around then drive home rather than catch the train. Wednesday will be the Souk Madinat and Mall of the Emirates, then they'll go on the desert safari. Thursday to the Burj Khalifa and Dubai Mall and dinner out in the evening. They fly home on the Friday.

When the kidults come to visit

Child 4 and 4a have been here on their holidays.

Most of the time it's just me and Peter and the cat and dog. Actually a lot of the time, it's just me or Peter and the cat and dog.

I like my own company, but I get bored and lonely. I guess what I actually like is just being able to do my own thing when I want and how I want, something I can't do when we have visitors.

At 46, I'd like to think I'm not old, but spending so much time on my own I get stuck in my ways, I have my own little routines and as Dubai is a vibrant and busy city with 5 tourists per resident, it gets busy, the roads get full, my stress levels go up and I retreat indoors.

The best way to see Dubai and explore the city is by setting off early in the morning. But 4 and 4a are in their early 20's and by comparassion they are party animals, night owls. Dragging them out of bed by 9am and having them ready for the day has been hard work. I've been going to bed later and I'm even more grumpier than usual.

After a day out they want to come home at 4pm, shower, rest, change and go back out at 6pm. I'm ready to get in my pj's by then having entertained all day, I'm hungry and get 'hangry' and having battled my way across Dubai already I really don't feel like doing it again at night when the traffic doubles, the number of people increases and everywhere is mega busy.

'You don't have to stay with us all day, just drop us off and we'll let you know when we want collecting'

So I took them to the Marina for 6pm and collected them at 9pm one evening. Of those 3 hours, I spent 90 mins dropping them off, going home, returning to collect them. During the 90 minutes of 'me time' I emptied the dishwasher, did a load of washing, walked the dog, cleaned the kitchen and swept up piles of sand from the house.

I find having visitors very tiring, I'm not on holiday, housework still needs doing and I have to adjust to being on my own all day, to accommodating others, not being able to just grab my bag and come and go when I choose, eat when I want and go to bed at my time of choosing.

I don't resent having visitors, I just forget what it's like living with other people.

Of course one of the benefits of people visiting is that as their unpaid tour guide, chauffeur and cook. I get free coffees, gifts, treated to dinner and lots of lovely company that I crave in a normal week and I get to book the activities and therefore choose the times and look forward to a day on my own as I send them off on a desert safari from mid day till 10pm. I also get to go places I wouldn't normally go to on my own, do different things and have new experiences.

Sadly when you're an expat with kids living in different countries, it's 'all or nothing' I've been learning to embrace time on my own, I have the freedom to travel to the UK when I want/need to and will be returning to the UK for the summer. Sadly, I still end up doing all the running around and the arranging or I just don't end up going anywhere. Although to be fair to Child 4 and 4a and their parents, they have looked after us very well when we've visited them in Northern Ireland

I'm done with being a tour guide

Since November 18th 2016 we've welcomed a friend, my mother, 2 kids and our niece into our home for a holiday. For my mother and our niece it's been their first and probably only visit to Dubai. For the kids it will be their last trip for a year or so.

It's been busy, expensive and very tiring. Up until December 16th I was working full time and despite it being winter in Dubai, at 28c most days it was too hot for my mother to go out in the day, so we did things on the weekends and evenings instead.

With all the places visited and time spent cooking meals, extra washing and tidying as well as just time spent sitting and chatting, the housework got neglected.

I wrote something similar in 2015 after yet another spate of visitors. Despite knowing Dubai well now, I still don't know what everyone wants to do and it's hard work organising everything.

My wallet also suffered quite badly and while I don't begrudge a single dirham we spent, it has been a very expensive 2 months. I've given up work now, I don't think I would've managed that as well after Christmas. Although everyone paid their own way, they were heavily subsidised and of course there were my costs. Purchasing the Entertainer App at AED 445 (£99) saved a lot of money with 2 for 1 deals, but paid for itself with one visit to Wild Wadi water park and I made sure we ate and visited where possible, the places available on the app.

I have of course visited many places on my own as a tourist when I first visited here and with Peter on weekends and many more places have opened and changed over the past 3 years. I had thought we'd use more public transport, something I do when I'm on my own, but we really didn't have the time with everything we wanted to fit in. Fuel costs are low and parking almost everywhere is free.

While everyone chipped in and bought ice creams and coffees, laid the table, tidied up, collected their washing and did the ironing (thanks Dan) I am glad they've all gone home now and I have some time on my own, time to tidy and clean the house, catch up with neglected paperwork, get on with various projects, blog and just work to my own schedule, I know that in a few weeks I'll be bored, lonely and looking for something to do.

What I need now is a holiday, to a place where things are new to me, a place I can explore, relax in and chill out away from home. While all our visitors are on holiday, I live in Dubai, it's home, it's not a holiday destination for me.

We're off to Luxor at the end of the month for a few days, which although is a place we visited around 10 years ago, it's somewhere we've always wanted to go back to. We have a few other trips lined up to the UK and will be visiting Leeds and Northern Ireland where 2 of our kids live and hopefully a visit to Dublin and Munich to see friends who used to live in South Africa. It will be nice to explore some new places. But when we're back at home in the South West we just spend our time visiting people and not being tourists. It would be lovely if on this trip we visited places with family and friends rather than sitting in their house or having coffee in town.

We've decided that future visitors will be given a Nol travel card, a map, sim card and instructions on how everything works, they will book their own flights, change their own money and will be given a quick tour so they can get their bearings. We will of course join in with a few things, dinners etc, but we just can't keep up this level of entertainment and cost.

So if you're coming out to see us any time soon, you have been warned and if we're coming over to see you, be prepared to provide us with a list of things to do where you live, that you think we'll like to visit. We'll sort our own flights, money, sim cards, car hire etc.

I know it sounds harsh, but we really have enjoyed all our visitors over the previous 6 years, both here in Dubai and in South Africa, but we're done now with being tour guides.

This is where Peter and I have been over the past 2 months and we've done these places most times we've had visitors, regardless of their length of stay, family or friends, with and without kids.

Desert Safari x 1
Miracle Gardens x 1
Wild Wadi x 1
Dubai Garden Glow x 1
Rain Forest x 1
Afternoon tea x 2
Led display x 2
Global Village x 2
Burj Khalifa x 2
Aquariums x 2
City Walk x 2
Walk along the canal x 3
Ferry and Souks x 3
Souk Madinat x 3
Fountains x 5
Mercato Mall x 5

Too many visits to count
Mall of the Emirates
Dubai Mall
Meals out
Trips to the desert
Visits to the beach

Other Malls visited
Outlet Village, Mirdiff City Centre, Oasis Mall, Marina Mall

Airport runs -  collections and drop off's x 8

Being a tour guide in your own country

Living in a foreign country means I can add 'tour guide' to my resume.

Don't get me wrong, I love having visitors, but I hate being a tour guide.

I'm more than happy to take my visitors to a local mall, gardens, historical site, building etc but I'd really love it if when we got there, they took the lead. I find it tiring deciding on where to eat, what shop to go into. I don't know where the best coffee place is, I don't have a memory bank of where the nearest toilet is at any given time and I can't recommend the best place to eat because a) I don't eat out much and b) it depends on what you want to eat and how much you want to pay.

Most of our visitors travel on their own, when we do have couples to visit, they hire a car, we give them a map, sim cards, a key, tell them what time dinner is (they don't have to eat with us, just let us know) and off they go.  I can then have some time off, catch up with some cleaning or just have some 'me time'

You see I spend so much time on my own, that even though I crave visitors, it all gets too much for me. It's all or nothing and I'm no longer used to being on the go 24 hours a day since the kids left home and on a daily basis I only have myself to think about so all of a sudden having someone else around 24 hours a day is tiring.

I'm not good at living in a foreign country, I don't seek it out, nor do I relish the whole process of making friends, finding new places, exploring. I don't actually enjoy it. It's just something that I do, I have to do. The only other option, which has happened before, is to give up and just sink into depression.

It would be nice when visitors come for them to say 'right, I've done some research and I'd love to explore a, b and c. Would you like to join me and we can explore somewhere new and different together?' or even 'I'm sure you're probably bored of taking visitors round the same places every time, is there anywhere new you'd like to see?'

But it ain't going to happen is it? If it does, it'll be because I've suggested it and as usual I'll be the one stood at the front with the map working out where to go and how.