Travel Bucket List: The Burj Al Arab

Hi there!

Before I get started talking about one of my many dream travel destinations, I want to share something funny that happened to me today.  Last night, I had a little bonfire beach party with a couple of my coworkers and some other Dingo Beach locals.  Once the boys decided that they were tired of sitting around and staring at the fire, we all headed back to Trent's house to continue the party at an indoor location (Trent is one of the few young-ish locals who frequents the Dingo Beach pub).  I may or may not have put on a nice little table dancing show for my friends and then I ended up sleeping on Trent's couch because I couldn't be bothered walking all the way back to my place at night.  

(I'll add a photo of the bonfire here when I get around to uploading all the new ones)

This morning, I woke up to sunshine streaming through the window and a fully swollen upper lip.  It turns out that some sort of insect bit my lip while I was sleeping and turned me into a semi-permanent duck face!  Luckily, the swelling went down pretty quickly and was all but unnoticeable by the time I had to go to work.  While it lasted, though, my friend Luke (he's the head chef at the Dingo Beach Hotel) kept saying things like "your lip has a lip on it" and then laughing a whole lot.  

Now that I've bored you all to tears with my idiotic ramblings, let's move on to the good stuff shall we?

Ever wanted to stay in the world's only seven star hotel ever created?  Yep, that's what I thought.  Well then, let me introduce you to the Burj Al Arab; the world's only seven star hotel.  The video that I posted below pretty much tells you everything you need to know about it but just in case you can't watch it or don't feel like watching it, let me tell you a little bit about it myself.

The following is a quote from Wikipedia because I'm feeling too lazy to put all this stuff into my own words.  Why make the effort when it's so easy to just plagiarize it all? Just kidding.  Kinda. Wikipedia probably does a better job of describing things than I could anyways:

"Burj Al Arab (Arabic: برج العرب‎,Tower of the Arabs) is a luxury hotel located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. At 321 m (1,053 ft), it is the fourth tallest hotel in the world. Burj Al Arab stands on an artificial island 280 m (920 ft) out from Jumeirah beach, and is connected to the mainland by a private curving bridge. The shape of the structure is designed to mimic the sail of a ship. Sometimes incorrectly referred to as "the world's only seven-Star hotel", its star rating has been often debated."

The hotel houses two restaurants, one of which contains an aquarium which holds 9,900,000 liters of water.  Those of you who actually know me will know how much I love fish and aquariums.  I would probably go to that restaurant and spend hours just staring at that aquarium.  You'd better be a rock star or a member of the British Royal Family if you want to stay here, however.  The rooms range from $1000 to $27,000 per night.  The Burj has been referred to by one critic as "a theater of opulence".  It better be at that price range! It's ok, though.  My daddy says that I'm a princess so I'm just gonna go ahead and book the Royal Suite for my next holiday weekend!  

Here are some photos to tickle your fancy:

Al Mahara Restaurant

Al Muntaha Restaurant

A view of the Burj at night

A truly opulent hallway

The Luxury Suite

Seriously though, if you really want to see what the Burj al Arab is all about, just watch that video that I have so conveniently posted right up there on this very web page.

Still not impressed?  Well I'm sorry to have to give you the bad news over the internet like this, but you are certified crazy and need to be thrown straight into the loony bin!

What's on your travel bucket list?  I'd love to hear about the places that you hope to visit before you kick the bucket!

Note: It's not actually clear to me whether the seven-star rating claim has been self-granted by the managers of the hotel or if it was just the result of some clever wording in a review written by a critic.  Either way, it has proven itself to be a very successful marketing strategy.