…cute!

Whenever you have the chance to widen your horizon – do it 🙂

Distance: less than 1h by plane (AUH-BH))
Ideal stay: weekend trip
Temperature: depending on season, between 20ºC and 42ºC

My fav travel partner and I took a flight on Thursday evening and 40 min later we arrived in Bahrain. As usual we got our rental car right at the airport and drove to our Hotel – Sheraton Bahrain Hotel.

..lets start his LOVEly weekend..

Bahrain is well-known for its Formula 1 track in the south of the island and among the “drinkers” for the party place to be within the Middle East.

At around 10ish we woke up; went for breakfast in our VIP Lounge (since we got a room upgrade) and made our route for the day.
As you know: we share our “travel-job” – I am in charge of the overall To-Do of the particular city and he is in charge of the perfect route plan.

Our first stop:

The bridge which connects Bahrain and Saudi-Arabia. Probably the closest I will ever get to this rather “special” country.

To be very honest – the atmosphere over here was quite strange and paradox.
Saudi is known for strict rules, misogynistic conduct, anti alcohol consumption and restricted entry requirements.
Having said this, it is absolutely weird to see all those Saudi cars stuck in traffic on a friday on the bridge in order to enjoy a casual weekend in Bahrain.

..hello barb wire fence.. 

Even if we do not agree with the regulations over there – we are grateful for all experiences and impressions we gather.

..off to our next stop..

We made our way through some abandoned villages and actually saw some of the so-called “burning tires”.
Shocking truth: those living conditions vs. European standard.
One more reason why we should always be grateful for what we have 🙂

Another 10km and we reached the famous Formula One track. Somehow “abandoned”, too.

We did our own tour; checked the souvenir shop and took some pictures. We got to admit that since we have the nicest Formula One track back home in Abu Dhabi – we were not too impressed over here.

On our way to the next official spot of our To-Do list, we spotted a nice shore and the open sea. As true sea lovers we HAD to stop over here and enjoy the moment.
1min & we we both walked barefoot in the water.. we enjoyed ourselves (#qualitytime), spotted thousand mini-mussels and discussed our upcoming life-plans.

..tu e eu..

After 45min we finally reached the famous – TREE OF LIFE.

This tree, located in the middle of the desert, is 400y old, almost 10m high and has green leafs. Green leafs? In the desert? Without rain? How is this possible? No one has a answer to this good question.

Since this is a touristic spot, too we were expecting way more people over there. Thankfully we had to share those views with 5 others – easy one.
Shared some LOVE with that fascinating tree and then we spotted another thing:

An oil-pump 😀 HaHa
Like in those movies.. a real oil-pump –  fascinated by this machine – we took some pictures, got excited and laughed hard. Us being us.

To-Dos for today: done.

We drove back to the city, enjoyed a snack in our VIP-lounge (gratis gratis), went to the gym and took a nap.

For dinner we went to a lovely, brazilian, meat-place and enjoyed an all-u-can-eat treat.
After our yummy dinner we enjoyed a romantic stroll through Reef Island.

The highlight of the evening was an Asian spot which a friend of ours recommended: Bushido.
No, the German Rapper does not own this spot 😉

We sat outside – yes, in April – because weather over here is just amazing. A thin cardigan is more than enough!

So many impressions, good laughter, great pictures, stories to tell, memories – time to sleep and get some energy for tomorrows action-day: last day in Bahrain.

..that elevator selfie..

Two grateful hearts went to sleep 🙂

Day 2

We took it pretty easy.. woke up.. went to the lounge.. had breakfast.. relaxed in our room.. I waited for him to finish some work stuff and then we went to explore the city centre.

We embraced the SOUQ-feeling. The REAL Souq-feeling not the “wannabe-Gold-Souq” in Dubai for eg..

He loves those sunflower seeds – and obviously he would never buy them w/o pre-tasting.
We walked through those narrow lanes, explored every corner and ended up at the Alfateh Grand Mosque.

The mosque was quite impressive – as usual – but I somehow got tired of those visits. Not because of the religion, nor location, etc.etc. but because I always gotta get the abaya although I am already wearing a long sleeve / long trousers.
With all due respect – but me being me – is an essential need.

..bockigeJenny..

After this impressive visit, we went to the National Museum and spotted the dhow-builders.

The whole Middle East has a pretty similar development history:
They came all the way from desert living, fishing, pearl-diving, handcrafting etc. over to the oil-boom which then led to economical setup & stabilization.
Great to be part of this whole process and able to witness this “live”. 🙂

..tanned & happy..

We love to check on old traditions – the real thing – the roots to all the new, modern, fancy structure.
We drove along the shore and found some traditional houses.
We stopped and entered..
It turned out – that those were not “public” but absolutely private houses.

Thankfully I am who I am – open-minded, kind, bold and cheeky – which is quite often a “door-opener” (literally in this case!).
Being blonde and having some arabic skills is indeed advantageous 😉

So there we were.. the locals showed us how to open oysters and how to spot pearls.. Wow! Absolutely cool and unique!

They offered some tea & biscuits – and showed us the greatest views towards the city of Bahrain.

Living for those moments! Spontaneously in the right place at the right time! 🙂

We left with another great experience in our bag!

The next & last To-Do spot: Qal’at al-Bahrain.

We played our princess & invader game – like in good old days.. laughed loads.. imagined magical stories and created memories which will last forever.

In order to round this weekend-trip off – we went for dinner on Amwaj Island.

We ordererd Arabic mezze; he enjoyed a well-deserved shisha (he had to handle me & my untamed hunger) and the aim was to finish our bahraini dinar.

In the end the whole order took ages and our timeframe to get the plane back to Abu Dhabi got smaller and smaller.
Thankfully I am the “cool”-one in our relationship when it comes to flights, schedule, etc. – therefore I tried my best to calm him down. We paid and drove to the airport.
We made it on time – obviously – & left this lovely place with another checked-ToVisit-Box 🙂