Azamara World Series - The Spice Route: Part 3, India to Dubai
Welcome back to the final part of this blog covering our 17 night voyage from Singapore to Dubai on the Azamara Quest. It had long been a dream of mine to travel to India and Sri Lanka, though Rich was less keen on visiting this part of the world, so we decided the best way to fulfil my dream was to take a cruise covering both countries. In this part we will travel from Mumbai in India to our final destination Dubai, via Muscat in Oman. Having left Mumbai and our four days in India behind we had a couple of seadays ahead of us. By now we had developed a sea day routine of waking early to start the day with some exercise, Rich in the gym and me out on the open decks, followed by a buffet breakfast and a lazy day round the pool, occasionally pooping along to one of the scheduled activities if they take our fancy. Evenings invariably involve moving between the Living Room to listen to the Fancy Triplets girl band or Gemma twinkling the ivories in The Den, taking dinner in either the Discoveries restaurant or the Windows cafe and popping into one of the two shows put on each evening.
Having spent much of our first sea day lazing around, the second sea day proved to be the complete opposite, filled with a variety of scheduled activities. After breakfast we made our way to the Cabaret lounge for the Azamara Quest expo, a showcase for the various ships departments where they set out a ‘stall’ to show guests some of what they do and answer any questions they may have. This was well attended by guests and proved to be an interesting way to spend an hour or so, especially having the opportunity to ask crew lots of questions about the day to day running of the ship. Between this and stopping at the photo gallery to enter some of our holiday snaps in the voyage photo competition the morning was quickly over and it was time for lunch in the patio grill. We tried to eat lightly this lunchtime as formal afternoon tea was scheduled in at the Aqualina restaurant this afternoon. This was a very elegant affair with each table decorated with a cake stand of finger sandwiches, little cakes, macaroons and scones for two, all accompanied by lovely piano music.
Unfortunately we couldn’t hang around too long as we had a bridge tour at 4.30pm. This was interesting mainly because the ship is older than others we have seen so the bridge layout is different with open wings for manoeuvres. The officer showing us round was very informative and while we were there we were treated to the most amazing sun set we have had all voyage. As we were approaching the Middle East the wind had picked up and the humidity dropped, meaning there was less haze and fewer clouds in the sky making for a perfect sunset with the sun actually hitting the horizon - perfect.
We awoke the next day in Muscat in Oman where we had booked to go on a traditional dhow cruise excursion. this started with a half hour coach ride Muscat’s marina where we boarded the dhow. The dhow itself was stunning, showcasing amazing craftmanship. We left the marina and headed off to the open seas for an hour and a half and though it was a little choppy it was a very relaxing time, taking income of the sights along the coastline, including luxurious hotel resorts and the magnificent palace, which we had seen from the road on the way to the dhow, but was even more impressive from the sea.
On the journey back to the ship the tour guide offered to drop us off in the town so we could have a wander around before taking the ships shuttle back tot he docks. We decided we would do this which we’re really glad we did, with a visit to the local souk a must if ever you’re in Muscat. We wandered the narrow shop lined alleys of the covered market for an hour or so taking in the sights and sounds of the tourists and locals as they shopped in the variety of stalls and small shops lining the markets alleyways.
With the next day being Thanksgiving day for the American guests on board the galley team had arranged a special and rather delicious Thanksgiving dinner for both the main dining room and the buffet. however, for us this was overshadowed by the fact that this was the scheduled evening for the amazing Azamara chocolate buffet evening, a voyage highlight for us. Coming out of this evening show we were not only presented with an amazing array of chocolate desserts and teats but the Christmas varies and also miraculously done their magic and started to put Christmas trees and decorations up around the ship.
To mark our arrival into Dubai in the early afternoon of the next day, the ship arranged one last deck barbecue lunch for us as we sailed into the harbour. We were overnighting in Dubai so this meant that a lot of the passengers were getting off of the ship mid afternoon to go on one last excursion before disembarkation the next day. We had decided to book the Bedouin dinner and sand safari excursion which proved to be a popular tour with many of our fellow passengers too. We left the ship mid afternoon and were taken off in our jeeps in groups of 6 for the drive out of Dubai city to the surrounding desert. After about an hour we reached our destination and strapped in for the thrilling sand safari, which definitely is not for the faint hearted. However, the highlight of the drive was stopping in the middle of the desert to watch the sun set over the dunes.
With the light fading we re-boarded our jeeps for the drive to the site of the Bedouin dinner, a large site set up in the middle of the desert, providing an almost theme park type experience for tourists. Here there was the option to have a go at sand boarding (which we didn’t do), ride a camel (which we did do), smoke a sheisha (which we didn’t do) and get a henna tattoo (which I did). Seating was arranged around a stage at typical kneeling tables with cushions laid out for us to sit on. Dinner consisted of a buffet style array of local dishes, served with local wines or beer before the evenings entertainment began. this started with a fire-eater, followed by a strange dance act, finished off with a belly dancer. As the evening drew to an end we made our way back to the jeeps for our drive back to the ship and our last night on board before disembarking the next day.
But our vacation was not quite over, we still had a nights stay at the infamous Queen Elizabeth 2, now a floating hotel located at Dubai harbour, and a day to explore Dubai before flying home form what had turned out to be an incredible voyage, visiting some amazing places, some unforgettable experiences and precious memories.
We would like to thank Azamara Cruises for gifting us this fabulous voyage and would recommend that if you get the chance to explore this part of the world then take the chance.
If you haven’t already, then please read part one and part two of this series which takes us from Singapore to Mumbai.
To see our video review of the Queen Elizabeth 2 then please take a look at our You Tube channel, where you can also see a review of our Emirates Boeing 777 and Airbus A380 business class flights.
To read a review of our Emirates business class flights then please click the link, or read Part 1 and Part 2 of this amazing voyage.
