Dubai and 5K

So I scrambled home from school on Thursday, 12 December to finish packing for a weekend in Dubai. Rebecca, Kelly and I got a cab to the airport and were on our way. We visited the Duty Free upon arrival and then headed for our hotel. It was a lovely place and quite comfortable.

Our room

Door to our room with cozy parlor type area just outside.

We awoke early the next morning and tried to find coffee. None of the coffee shops opened until 9:00am??? We grabbed a taxi to the Burj Khalifa and the Dubai Mall. We had some breakfast and then headed for the Burj and our 10:30 tour. This building is a little more than 2,700 ft. tall, and we went up to nearly 1,500 ft on the 124th floor. It only took about 3 minutes to get there by elevator. We looked down on the rooftops of 30-40 story buildings that looked miniscule. Even though it wasn’t a super clear day we could see vast distances.

Burj Khalifa

view straight down

the gap between the windows by my head is open to the outside

shadow cast over the surrounding neighborhoods

You can see forever!

After we descended from the skies, we climbed aboard a “hop-on-hop-off” double decker tour bus. We went all over Dubai and did some hopping off and on. We also managed to pick up our race packets and bought tutus.

huge aquarium in the Dubai Mall

Pyramid marks a mall with Egyptian theme

beautiful green areas here in Dubai

open towers on bops of buildings help to cool the lower floors

Burj Al Arab

Atlantis

It was beginning to darken as we returned to the hotel. Kelly had some school work to do, so we took it to a bar and got some dinner and a beer to work over. It was relaxing and a nice end to the day. We needed to get our rest for the 5K in the morning.

Both of us awoke early and got packed up. We took our luggage down to the lobby dressed in our race uniforms (Color Run t-shirt and tutu) to check out and arrange for our luggage to be stored. Then into the taxi to head for Motor City and the Autodrome where the Color Run was held. We got there early enough to be right at the front of the pack at the starting line. I was shortly left in the dust as I walked.

color cloud at the finish

at the finish

starting line…8,500 runners

At the end, which was a gigantic party, I discovered I had lost my wallet. It had all my cash, credit cards, bank card, and civil ID in it. That means instead of partying we spent the next 2 hours pacing around looking for my wallet. We asked everyone we could and left contact info with the race organizers. Finally deciding we couldn’t look anymore, we headed back to the hotel to try to get cleaned up as best we could and changed in the public restrooms in the lobby. Then headed to the airport not knowing what else we could do. While there I received an email saying they had found my wallet!! To make a long story short, a friend is going to Dubai over New Year’s and will collect my wallet for me so I will have it upon my return in the New Year.