50% off Say What...

In the last post I talked about being in many different FB groups. This post will begin the same way. Recently I joined a group called UAE Staycations and after browsing through the group my first thought was where has this been all my life???

The first thing I saw that caught my eye was this...

Mike and I have been talking about staying at a St. Regis ever since we saw this one on the Corniche. The rate being advertised was about 50% off the regular room rate. I talked to Mike about it and we decided we could not pass it up. St. Regis is a part of a chain we are Rewards members for and Mike's first thought was we're about to get points and we're going to get 20% off all of our food beverage. This was a no brainer really!






We arrived at the hotel and were greeted by such grandeur! This hotel was immaculate!

 

The valet took our car and the bellmen insisted on taking our bags. We were escorted to 1 of several check in desks and without hesitation or without asking us first we were brought a nice cold glass of juice which was delicious!

We went through the standard rigamarole of showing IDs and presenting a credit card and then the young lady who checked us in escorted us to the elevators and thanked us again for staying and for being Preferred Guests, which means we are members of their rewards program.

We got up to the 40th floor and our jaws dropped. We've stayed at our share of hotel rooms but this room was different than the others. See the video below for a tour of the room.

The view from our room humbled me ever so quickly. I'm amazed at the life I get to lead now and I'm so humbled and grateful for this opportunity. Check out the view.

We looked around and gawked at all of the things in the room and then the doorbell rang. It was the bellman bringing our bags and he let us know if we needed anything to dial "0". We thanked him and he left.

We looked at the view and just talked and the doorbell rang again. This time we had no idea who it could be. Well, it was our personal butler bringing us fruit, his business card, and explaining all of the things he would for us complimentary. With his permission I took a short video of part of his explanation.

Our butler left and then we were off to see "Avengers: Infinity War". Much to our surprise and partial chagrin the theater was filled with teenagers. We chose a time based on the amount of teenagers we thought would be there. Mike didn't want them talking throughout the movie and for the most part they didn't. The movie was really good. I know I'll be posting this blog before many of you have gotten a chance to see so I won't go into detail. I will say this one was filled with much more death than I had anticipated and in true Marvel fashion there was an extra scene at the end of the credits. Many of our fellow movie goers knew that because at the conclusion of the movie they did not leave.

We returned back to our hotel and were greeted with bedroom slippers beside the bed, the laundry services tray on the bed, and a massage coupon. Again, we were impressed.

We decided to eat on the property to be able to gain more Starwoods Points. Their restaurant The Terrace had a salmon vs. tuna buffet with grilled meat being offered too. The food was delicious and the service again was impeccable. I am not a beef eater because of what it does to my body but I sacrificed because it looked so good and I'm glad I did. The salmon was great and the dessert area was even better! I love chocolate and they had brownies and chocolate cake that I devoured along with some vanilla ice cream.

#DontJudge

I plan on working out extra this week and doing a week of salads! So, put away your judgement face. We ate until our heart's content and retired back to our room for the night.

 

All in all, night 1 was amazing and I can't wait to see what Day 2/Night 2 has in store.

We woke up Friday morning and decided to hit breakfast since it was included in our rate. We didn't want to over indulge since we would be enjoying the brunch later on in the day. There were so many breakfast options. The one thing that surprised me was seeing this...

Yep! Pork was being offered. Now, I'm not a big pork eater but I do love bacon with my pancakes so I had to get me 1 strip! Mike ordered a made to eat omelette and it looked wonderful. I'm not a fan to eggs so I stuck to the foods I really like.

We ate and talked and decided to rest up before our brunch reservation.

Before I talk about brunch let me first say that I had heard that the brunch at St. Regis is a 1 of a kind. I wasn't actually sure what to expect and I was pleasantly surprised and overwhelmed by what I saw. Let me walk you through then I want you to enjoy the video I created.

I walked up and gave them the name our reservation was under. I was escorted to the waiting area which was filled with beverages (alcoholic and non alcoholic) and cheese. We walked through the dessert room to get there though. That is not an overstatement or mistake, yes, a dessert room. Anyway, I was told about all of the many complimentary beverages and asked to just hang out until the hostess came to escort to my table. I walked around in awe with a drink in my hand. After a few minutes I was escorted to my table and the hostess explained all of the many stations/areas.

• Starter Station
• Live Pasta Station
• Tuscan Italian Station
• Beef Station
• Pork Station
• Hot Buffet Station
• Cold Seafood Station
• Cheese Fondue Station
• Grilled Station
• BBQ Station
• Grilled Fresh Seafood Station
• Pastry/Bread Station

Now, I bet you're wondering if the stations were stocked with food or was it just a small amount of food. The stations were filled with so many options! You'll see from the video. I did not know where to start so I walked around looking at what I wanted to try and just got 1 piece of bread to enjoy while I decided. After the bread I went for salt crusted salmon and jasmine rice. Both were so delicious! After that I tried to explore as many stations as I could. As I was enjoying my food, one of the chefs came around offering grilled chicken. It was so juicy and good!

Not long after he went by, another chef and a host came around offering 3 types of pasta: pesto lasagna, pasta carbonara, and another pasta I did not hear the name of. I tried each and I loved the pasta carbonara the most. I'm not a huge fan of pesto but it was good. Mike tried the 3rd kind and he said it was ok but his favorite was also pasta carbonara.

Shortly after they went by 1 of the bar tenders came around offering drinks even though our waiter had been bringing me various drinks to try. The bar tender made me a Mai Tai which was quite good.

We continued to eat, talk, and enjoy and then a chef came around asking us if we wanted to try chocolate. The chef was actually cutting the chocolate off of this huge round cylinder of chocolate. I love chocolate so I agreed to try it!

After enjoying the chocolate and drinks we were invited outside for the cutting of the champagne bottle. That was rather neat to see.

We went back in and tried to finish our drinks and what we had on our plates and then we decided to head back to our hotel room and relax from all of the food we just devoured.

We decided to go to the pool and get a view of the city at night and it did not disappoint.

I'm not a swimmer and I have never have been too keen on the water but Mike loves the water!

We returned back to our room and were greeted by this.

Now what you've been waiting for the video of the brunch! Please enjoy.

If you ever come to Abu Dhabi I would like to recommend staying at the St. Regis and enjoying their Friday brunch. We have had an amazing staycation! And it's not over. We were told that the Saturday breakfast won't end until 3:00pm! So, it is our plan to walk over to the beach and then come back and enjoy the breakfast. 

We didn't make it to the beach because the sleep monster wouldn't let us up but breakfast was great! We enjoyed it and then we checked out and headed home.

We had a wonderful Staycation and cannot wait until the next one!

Winner, winner, seafood dinner

One thing I've learned since being here is that there are Facebook groups for everything! I'm in a group on facebook called Best Bites of Abu Dhabi. This group is dedicated to people who like good food. Members of this group ask for recommendations for ladies nights, places to eat, places for takeout, and so much more. There are also various competitions that the admins of the groups will post too. I enter many of the competitions not thinking that I'll ever win. Well, my thinking was wrong! I won dinner for 2 at Al Ain Aloft's Thursday Seafood Feast.

Al Ain is about an hour and a half from Abu Dhabi. It is actually one of the cities we could have been placed. So, Mike and I decided to make a weekend trip of going to Al Ain to enjoy the Seafood Feast.

The scenery going to Al Ain was a reminder that we actually lived in the desert. Because I was driving and because my riding partner slept the entire ride 😏😒😂I couldn't get pictures of the camels just hanging out. I did get a few of the desert scenery though.

I especially loved being able to go 140 Km/h! The people here will flash their lights at you if they want you to move over. I was trying to keep up with the few people on the road but I got flashed a few times. LOL!

We finally got to the hotel and checked in. We opened our window and realized that we were literally right by the Hazza Bin Zayed Stadium. We knew it was close but we didn't know it was going to be what we saw out of our window. This stadium hosts soccer matches among many other events.

We sat for a few minutes and then got dressed and ready to attend to the Seafood Feast. We were so ready to eat. Our reservations were for 7pm but I quickly realized that we didn't need reservations even though that was what the restaurant advertised on their website. I think our expectations were based on our experiences in Abu Dhabi. We arrived and even though the display looked impeccable we expected more food since this was called a seafood feast. The seafood was good even though it wasn't plentiful. There weren't many options for sides. The options were 2 types of rice. I personally wished there were more sides. The brownies that were in the dessert area were DELICIOUS!!! We took pictures of everything.

Mike's freshly prepared shrimp and lobster

It was a nice and relaxing weekend. We had a wonderful time. I am so happy that I won this competition and I do hope I win more!

In other news we got our car windows tinted because the sun here is quite disrespectful!

School is still going well and I still love living here! I know we'll be here for a while. So, be kind to one another and Be uniquely you!

Until next time...

Spring Break 2018

8 months have gone by and Spring Break is here! Most of my colleagues and friends have planned to travel for Spring Break. Mike and I have gone back and forth about what to do and where to go. We decided since the weather was nice and there is SO much to do here we decided to do a Staycation. Yep, that's right we are going to relax and enjoy some of the things that the UAE has to offer.

One place we decided to go to was IMG World.

IMG World is the world's largest indoor theme park.

That's right all of the rides are inside and it was great. They had an offer where you buy admission tickets and with each ticket you get a meal voucher and a gift certificate to the Marvel Movie that comes out in April. After reading the fine print I realized that we can use it for any movie but we are going to use it for the Marvel movie.

IMG World had many different themed areas. There was Marvel, The Lost World, Cartoon Network, and IMG Boulevard. Each area had roller coasters, restaurants, and souvenir shops. My favorite ride was in The Lost World and it was called the Velociraptor. The path to get to the ride is all inside. The ride itself starts inside. It comes to a full and complete stop, while you're waiting you see that the ride itself is actually outside, and then it shoots up a huge hill which you can see upon arrival to IMG World. This ride had hills, loops, and speed; my kind of ride. You can experience the ride for yourself thanks to a youtube video I found.

 IMG World is in Dubai so we stayed the night in Dubai and just relaxed. We had earned a free night with a Marriott property so we decided to use it. If you're wondering about how we got a free night wonder no more I'll tell you, rewards points. Before we were dating or married Mike was a part of every rewards program known to man. I suggested we focus on a few so we'll be able to get points and attain all of the benefits. As far as hotel chains are concerned we mainly stay at Marriotts and IHG properties. IHG properties are Holiday Inn, Staybridge Suites, Crowne Plaza and that's just a few. Marriott also offers rewards if you book excursions with them too. That program is called Marriott Moments. If you read the blog about our first visitor the trip to the desert she and I took was booked through Marriott Moments. Read that blog by clicking here.

If you want to join Marriott or IHG you can click either picture below. We don't get anything if you join. I'm just trying to help you save money.

During Spring Break we ventured to a Fruits and Vegetable Market. I've been doing smoothies regularly and during a regular week I go through about 8-10 packs of spinach. 1 pack of spinach in the store can be between 9-13 dirhams. So, you do the math. When someone mentioned to Mike how cheap it was at this market we put it on our list of things to do. It is located right by Port Zayed so we were able to see yachts and cruise ships which made us look into taking a cruise that leaves from Abu Dhabi or Dubai.

The market was crowded with many vendors. I was able to get enough spinach for Mike and I both to do smoothies for a week. That's right Mike is going to join me on my next cleanse which actually starts tomorrow, April 1. Anywho the spinach only cost me 8 dirhams. 8 dirhams is like 2.18USD. Color me happy! I wish I would have taken pictures but I was so happy I forgot. I will definitely be going back so look for pictures in a future blog. Below is a picture I found on google.

Other than just hang out at the house and have dinner with friends my Spring Break was relaxing. During this week we did plan out an epic summer that I'm so ready for!

Be Kind to one another and Be Uniquely You! Until next time...