We arrived in Dubai after an hour and a half flight to the Maldives to pick up more passengers then another 4 or so hours to Dubai. We arrived in the early hours of the morning, and sailed through security. We spent some uncomfortable time trying to sleep in the chairs in arrivals - not very pleasant. At around 7am we got some coffee and breakfast in Costa - covered by screens as its Ramadan - so no food was available outside the airport until nightfall.

We caught the Dubai metro to the Dubai mall. The train took us past the strangely deserted and sterile ( due to the 50 degree heat outside!) city with its shining glass and concrete skyscrapers. From here you can walk through the air conditioned modern mall to the bottom of the Burj Khalifa - the tallest building in the world.

The "at the top" experience was quite theatrical with music, video and lights buildin up to the dramatic lift ride up to the 124th floor (out of over 200!) From here the view was undeniably astounding. The city is built out of the haze of an expanse of desert and the Burj is about twice as high as everything else around it - making the already massive skyscrapers look small on comparison. You could go outside to also look at the view (but not for long due to the intolerable heat!)

We headed back down and quickly popped outside to catch a view of the immense building from the bottom, before we headed back through the air conditioned mall and metro to the airport. The flight back to London on the large A380 was comfy for me (we had front row seat so loads of leg room) but not so much for Emily who felt nauseous.

We arrived back around 6pm in the evening after an incredible trip full of a great deal of very contrastingly wonderful exoeriences. Sad it wasnt longer (we will have to go back to see the parts we missed!) but glad to back in time for the Olympics!