One activity in Dubai that was a must-do was a desert safari. We had heard from friends that it’s a fun way to get a glimpse at Bedouin life and to see the desert. Initially, I was super excited because the tour was packed with activities: dune bashing, camel rides, sandboarding, henna, local costume dress-up, live belly dance, fire, and tanoura show, and a buffet dinner. Given the price of the tour, I thought it just might be too good to be true. And guess what? It was. Read on for my honest evening Dubai desert safari review.
Dubai Desert Safari Review – Do your research
I can’t stress this enough: do your research before booking a tour. I’m used to travelling to Asian countries where you walk around and see dozens of little tour company kiosks that you can approach. You can browse the different tours on offer, compare prices, and then choose whichever one best fits your needs. That’s not the same in Dubai, so we ended up booking our tour through Klook. We looked at a few different evening desert safari reviews on Klook and chose the one with good reviews at the best value.
Ultimately, I think we got what we paid for. Our tour was a very reasonable HK$185 per person, so we probably should have known there was going to be a bit of a catch. If I had the chance to go back and do it again, I would probably try to find something with a more intimate and less touristy feel to it.
Dune Bashing Experience
A white SUV came to pick us up from our hotel around 3:00pm. The SUV was already full with other tourists, so we made our way to this area where we were meant to wait for the other SUVs that would be in our fleet. I was a bit annoyed already as we all just wanted to get on with the tour, but I’ve been on plenty of tours to know this is just how things work. At this stop, there were people trying to sell food and drinks, souvenirs, and photos with an eagle. You could also pay to go out into the dessert on a dune buggy, though I’m not sure there would be enough time for that. We pretty much just waited around for our tour guide to return and tell us to go back to the vehicle.
We then drove another 5 or so minutes before driving into the dessert where we stopped for a quick photo op before beginning. I will say, our tour guide was great and offered to take plenty of photos of the three of us.
After all of the other vehicles were there, we began the dune bashing. It was honestly a hilarious experience. There was an older Chinese lady in our SUV who was freaking out – screaming, covering her mouth, and at some points we actually thought she was going to throw up (luckily I wasn’t beside her). The ride lasted around 30 minutes, but wasn’t insanely scary in my opinion. There were a few twists, turns, and a bit of air that had my stomach in a knot, but nothing that I was actually worried about. That being said, this is not something I would take young children on.
It wasn’t until later that we heard that dune bashing is not good for the environment. All of the sand that is displaced and the commotion caused has actually affected the wildlife that live in the dessert. There are other tours that drive through the dessert without the dune bashing. This is something I would recommend looking into before booking your tour.
The Bedouin Camp
After the dune bashing, we made our way to a bedouin camp. These bedouin camps are meant to mimic the camps used by travellers who made their way through the desert on camel and needed to rest for a night or two. Because we were in the middle of the desert and there were dozens of bedouin camps around, we stopped at two different camps before finally finding the right one.
When we were dropped off at the correct camp, one of the staff of the bedouin camp told us that we could sit in a private area with couches and a good view of the stage, and have our food brought to us instead of lining up for the buffet for an additional fee. I can’t remember the exact price, but it was somewhere around HK$100 each. Since we had already paid for the tour (and I hate when people try to upsell things to me), we declined.
Camel rides, henna tattoos, and shisha
To top that off, we had to sit and wait around for at least an hour before the show started until all of the other tour groups arrived. There were probably about 150-200 other tourists in the bedouin camp. While we waited we could get tea, go on a 1 minute camel ride, and get a henna tattoo.
There were two camels outside the camp that were being mistreated by the guide. He was yelling at them, pulling aggressively on their ropes, etc., which made me feel incredibly uncomfortable. No shock here, but they were trying to sell people a longer camel ride. As for the henna tattoo, a very simple, untraditional small piece was included (I rubbed mine off after because I really didn’t like it). Otherwise, you could get a larger more traditional piece for an additional price.
I don’t smoke shisha, but we were told that shisha was included in our tour package. Apparently, the free shisha was only being offered after 7:00 pm and if you wanted it beforehand, you had to pay for it. We also didn’t hear anything about the sandboarding that was apparently included in our tour as well.
The belly dance, fire, and tanoura show & buffet dinner
After what felt like forever, the night kicked off with the first live show of the evening. The fire show was fine, but if you’ve ever travelled to Thailand, you’ve likely seen dozens of fire shows, so this wasn’t particularly special nor did it feel like an authentic experience.
After the fire show came the belly dancer. I was actually a bit surprised to see this as I thought the UAE was much more conservative. Either way, she was fun and engaged the audience throughout her show which led to a few laughs.
After the first two shows, it was time to get our food. They had everyone line up in two lines; one for males and the other for females. This was a buffet dinner, but I really did not enjoy the food. One thing that threw me off was that they closed the buffet dinner promptly after everyone sat back down so you couldn’t go up for seconds if there was something you liked (or if you were still hungry).
The final live show of the evening was the tanoura show. I found this more interesting as it’s something I had never heard of before. After doing a bit more research afterwards, I discovered this is actually an Egyptian folk dance.
Overall views on the evening dessert safari in Dubai
Ultimately, I’m still glad we had the chance to experience the dessert safari. However, if I were to do it again, I would choose a more intimate, environmentally conscious, and animal friendly company. I really believe you get what you pay for and that can definitely be said in this situation. If you’re willing to pay more for a better experience, look into more boutique companies that won’t exploit workers and camels, and will ensure that you get the best possible dessert safari tour there is in Dubai.
